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Swabian Stories. 



THEODORE TILTON. 



For I had hope, by something rare, 

To prove myself a poet, 
But while I plan and plan, my hair 

Is gray before I know it." 

— Will Waterproof's Monologue. 



■copyright 5 ; 



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SEP 28 1882 



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Of WASH 



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NEW YORK : 

R. WORTHINGTON, 770 Broadway. 

MDCCCLXXXIE 






Copyright, 

1882, 

By THEODORE TILTON. 



PRESS OF J. J. LITTLE L CO., 
MOS- ID TO 20 ASTOR PLACE, NEW YORK. 






Knscrtbctr 

TO MY 

FATHER AND MOTHER, 

AS AN 

AFFECTIONATE TRIBUTE 

TO THEIR 

Venerable Age 

AND 

Honorable Life. 



PREFACE 



SWABIA is no longer on the map. Schwabenland 
of the sixteenth century is overlapped and blotted 
out by Wiirtemberg of the nineteenth ; but Swabia, 
as a name, is still alive on men's lips — like Albion, 
Erin, Gallia, or Columbia. It has faded from geog- 
raphy, to be perennial in memory and fancy. 

Among the patriotic people whose native land it 
designates, it is a tender synonym for their love of 
country — a fond term to indicate their ancient line- 
age and sturdy stock. Allemania is an older title 
for the same region, but the pet name is always 
Swabia. In Ulm or Esslingen, a proud son of the 
soil who says deliberately, u I am a Wurtemberger," 

5 



6 PREFACE. 

cries enthusiastically, " I am a Schwab." People 
of other countries may smile and say, " Phoebus, 
what a name ! " but though the Schwabs, by the 
quaintness of their patois, and by other national 
oddities and peculiarities, have rendered themselves 
" a cause for wit in others," yet even when the 
laugh is against them, they still seem proud to be 
proverbed, and they always wear their patronymic 
as a badge of honor. Swabia is their country's 
name, not its nickname. It is the most character- 
istic and genuine of all the titles of their fatherland. 

The people are a staunch, honest, rustic race — 
with a dogged dignity of manner — with a solemn 
love of sober enjoyment — and with a perpetual 
glow of human kindliness in their good and Gothic 
hearts. 

Their picturesque and hilly country — though 
hardly so large, and not so grand as Switzerland — 
possesses many a haunt of beauty which the stranger, 
having once seen, will ever afterward remember. 
The Swabian Alps are nature's stepping-stones to 
the Alps of Switzerland ; the two countries are sep- 



PREFACE. 7 

arated from each other only by the narrow width 
of Lake Constance, and one mirror reflects the 
beauties of both. The Swabian Valleys of Urach 
are bewitching solitudes in which the fox and the 
wild deer dwell within the sound of village bells. 
The Black Forest is an enchanted borderland of 
Swabian Romance. The "dark-rolling Danube" 
is of Swabian origin. The Neckar, a fair daughter 
of the Rhine, is of Swabian career. And, although 
Germany is not one of the chief gardens of the 
earth, as England is, yet if there be a German gar- 
den-spot that may compare with Devonshire, it is 
the smiling Valley of the Neckar; in other words, 
it is Swabia. 

Whoever roams through it in summer time, will 
find vineyards, music, and rural mirth, together 
with many a crumbled castle, more beautiful in its 
^•uin than in its prime. 

It is the country of the Minnesingers of old. It 
is the country of the renowned Eberhart Im Bart, 
whom his fellow countrymen glorify as the Ameri- 
cans idolize George Washington. It is the country 



8 PREFACE. 

of Kepler, the illustrious astronomer. It is the 
country of Tubingen and its time-honored Univer- 
sity. It is the country of Schubart and Frischlin 
and other heroes of free speech. It is the country 
of Danneker and his antique chisel. Above all, it 
is the country of Schiller and Wieland and Uhland 
— names to whose endless honor the whole earth is 
a monument. 

It is with good reason, therefore, that Swabia, 
though lost from the map, survives forever in his- 
tory, poetry, and romance. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

Dedication 3 

Preface 5 

The Silver Bell of Stuttgart 13 

The Romance of the Rothenberg 59 

The Fate of Frisciilin 79 

The Ass of Hohen Neufen 91 

The Maids and Wives of Weinsberg 113 

The Ragged Bard of Rambin 125 

The Boast of Eberhart 143 

The Phantom Ox 153 

Charlemagne and Hildegard 161 

The Besieged Nuns of Kirchheim 169 

Ballad of a Baby 189 

The King's Wager 195 

The Double Stratagem 217 

Fritz Ottocar's Fellow-Huntsman 225 

9. 



IO CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

Eberhart Im Bart 231 

The Chamois Hunter 239 

Prince Heinrich's Carving-knife 251 

The Minnesinger's Wife 261 

Notes 267 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTT- 
GART. 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

[on the old church called the stiftkirche.] 



There hangs above the giddy height 

Of Stuttgart's tallest tower 
A silver bell, in open sight, 

That gleams through sun and shower, 

And glitters when the moon is bright, 

And rings at nine and twelve at night, 

Yet strikes no other hour. 

13 



14 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

II. 

The town hath bells of louder tongue, 
Some seven or eight, or more ; 

But this apart from all is hung, 
Nor mingles in their roar; 

And quivers after it hath rung, 

As if a nightingale had sung, 
That all too soon forbore. 



III. 

For noisy revellers at the bowl, 
The cadence may be drowned ; 

But lovers in their nightly stroll, 
The watchman in his round, 

The pillowed sick, the wakeful soul, 

And all who ever hear it knoll 
Are haunted by the sound. 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 1 5 

IV. 

For, though they hear it many a time, 

And though they love it well, 
And though it hath a merry chime, 

As of a wedding bell, 
It thrills them like a grewsome rhyme, 
And wakes the memory of a crime, — 

A very deed of hell. 



V. 

Who was it gave that silver gift, 
That bell as white as snow, 

Which first above the stately Stift 
Rang many a year ago, 

And which, without a flaw or rift, 

Doth still a cheery voice uplift 
Above a world of woe ? 



1 6 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

VI. 

It was Ulrica — she who did 
The deed so foul, so famed ; 

Whose crime so long a time lay hid, 
But was at last proclaimed ; 

And yet, O sufferer, God forbid 

That thou be now too rudely chid, 
Too pitilessly blamed ! 



VII. 

Until her love was ill repaid, 
She never wrought a wrong ; 

And though, in jealous rage, the maid 
Took vengeance swift and strong, 

Yet afterward she wept and prayed, 

And on her quivering flesh she laid 
A penance fierce and long. 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 1 7 

VIII. 

Men say she had the sweetest face 

In Swabia ever known, — 
Save only one of riper grace, — 

Which was her mother's own ; 
And they were fairest of their race, 
With just the difference one could trace 

In bud and rose full-blown. 



IX. 

Ulrica's sire was in his tomb ; 

Her Lady Mother dear, — 
Close in her castle and her room, — 

Had mourned for him a year ; 
But grief must have an end of gloom : 
And on her rueful cheek the bloom 

Made haste to reappear. 



1 8 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

X. 

The lady, lofty in her rank, 

And rich in her domain, 
Was Duchess from the Neckar's bank 

To Weissenberger plain, — 
While at her table ate and drank 
The Swiss, the Swabian, and the Frank,— 

For all were of her train. 



XI. 

Then, down frem every castled heighl 
That guards the Neckar's Isles, 

Came every wifeless duke and knight 
Within a hundred miles ; — 

Who all, like moths that see a light, 

Were tempted by her beauty bright 
To risk her dangerous smiles. 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 1 9 

XII. 

A spendthrift youth, Sir Hildebrand, 

In fortune's narrow strait, 
Rode forth to join the rival band 

Who gathered at her gate, — 
And since he owned no rood of land, 
He wanted, with her heart and hand, 

Her castle and estate. 



XIII. 

He crossed the treacherous Alpine snows,- 

He swam the Neckar's flood ; 
But neither ice nor tempest froze 

The ardor of his blood ; 
Yet rash was he when first he chose, — 
For when he came to pluck the rose, 

He more admired the bud. 



20 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

XIV. 

Then, surging through his heart and brain, 

There swept a swelling tide 
More wild than tempest of the main, — 

For passion warred with pride ; 
And, reckless of his honor's stain, 
He wooed the widowed Chatelaine, 

Yet loved the maid beside. 



XV. 

From nobles, courtly yet uncouth, 

From" burghers, rich yet gray, 
« 
The widow turned her to the youth, 

And would not say him nay, 
But yielded willingly forsooth, 
And loved in secret yet in truth, 

And wished her wedding-day. 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 21 

XVI. 

Sir Hildebrand heaved many a sigh, 

For troubled was his breast ; 
But when she asked the reason why, 

He answered with a jest, 
And swore for her to live and die ; 
And yet he inly scorned the lie, 

And loved the daughter best. 



XVII. 

A dagger dangled from his girth, 

Of silver hilt and blade ; 
And since Ulrica, in her mirth, 

Had with the weapon played, — 
And since it was a thing of worth, — 
He marked it with her name and birth, 

And gave it to the maid. 



22 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

XVIII. 

The happy girl, with eyes that beamed, 

Gazed on the carven haft, 
Kissed the bright letters as they gleamed, 

Pinned with the silver shaft 
Her golden hair, — (whose braids, she deemed, 
By contrast all the fairer seemed,) — 

Then blushed, and lightly laughed. 



XIX. 

Ulrica — save to him who won 
Her love so fond and true — 

Told her pure passion unto none, 
But did as-maidens do, — 

At least as maidens oft have done,- 

Hid it from all beneath the sun ! — 
Yea, from her mother too. 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 23 

XX. 

Then said her Lady Mother fair, 
" My daughter, search the town, 

And choose a satin rich and rare, 
And white as eider down, 

And cut it with a cunning care, 

And sew for me a robe to wear, 
To be my wedding-gown ! " 



XXI. 

" Thou art as fair," the girl replied, 

" As fitteth thy degree ; 
And when thy weeds are laid aside, 

Still fairer wilt thou be ; 
So prithee, in thy love and pride, 
Sweet mother, when thou art a bride, 

Who shall the bridegroom be?" 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

XXII. 

" My child, I thought thy wit had guessed 5 

For nobly was he born, 
And bravely on the mountain's crest 

He held his life in scorn/ — 
To prove his love by gallant test ; — 
And holy church shall make us blest 

On happy Easter morn." 



XXIII. 

" How can I guess, O mother sweet, 
Who is thy bridegroom brave ? — 

For many knights are at thy feet, 
Who buffet wind and wave, — 

Who ride on coursers strong and fleet,—* 

Who shine in coats of mail complete, — 
And swing the glittering glave."' 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 25 

XXIV. 

" My child, I love a youth deprived 

Of castle and of land, — 
So young, he never yet hath wived, 

Yet woos my widowed hand ! 
The heart is cunningly contrived — 
And love, though dead, may be revived! 

I wed Sir Hildebrand." 



XXV. 

Ulrica, when she heard her fate, 
Grew hot and then grew cold ; 

A love that turns to sudden hate 
Makes timid creatures bold ; 

The passion of the meek is great ; 

She did the deed which bards relate, 
And chroniclers have told. 



26 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 



XXVI. 



The legend runs in many ways, — 

The truth is hard to know ; 
For, since the tale is told of days 



So long, so long ago, 



There rests upon the deed a haze,- 
As if to dim to human gaze 
Its lineaments of woe. 



XXVII. 

The Duchess had a shady wood, 
That round her castle lay ; 

Where often, in her widowhood, 
She went at dawn of day 

To spend the morn in solitude 

Or on her crucifix to brood, 

And count her beads and pray. 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 2J 

XXVIII. 

And ever as she went or came, 

She scattered golden store 
To bless the poor and sick and lame 

At many a cottage door; 
For many a proud and highborn dame 
So served in mercy's tender name 

In those stern times of yore. 



XXIX. 

The Duchess, on her bridal day, 
At dawn, had disappeared ; 

Unwed, nor clad in bride's array ; 
And so her maidens feared 

That she had early gone to pray, 

And strayed too far, and lost her way 
In woods so wild and weird. 



28 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

XXX. 

Bright through the chapel-window gleamed 

The Easter morning's sun ; 
Into the aisles the people streamed ; 

The anthem was begun ; 
The priest, who waited, little dreamed 
That in the woods a voice had screamed ! — 

A murder had been done! 



XXXI. 

How could Ulrica, coy and meek, — 

Ulrica, soft and mild, — 
Whose heart was tender as her cheek,- 

How could so sweet a child 
Upon so dear a mother wreak 
With tiger's tooth — with eagle's beak— 

A jealous rage so wild ? 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 29 

XXXII. 

It was as if from out the sky 

The shyest star should fall, 
And hitherward in wrath should fly 

To blast the earth's green ball : 
A deed with which no deed could vie — 
So out of nature, that well nigh 

It could not be at all ! 



XXXIII. 

The people scattered to and fro, 
With minds foreboding ill, 

And hunted high, and hunted low, 
And tramped from glen to hill, 

And traced the Neckar in its flow, 

And went wherever foot could go, — 
Until the night grew chill. 



30 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

XXXIV. 

Ulrica, pale and overwrought, 

Sat stricken yet resigned ; 
She went not forth with those who sought 

Whom only she could find, — 
Nor asked if tidings had been brought, 
But sat and sat, and thought and thought, 

And none could read her mind; 



xxxv. 

Between her hands she clasped her head 
With fingers stiff and numb ; 

And sat as rigid as the dead, 
And silent as the dumb ; 

And only once she spake and said : 

" Ye need not spread the bridal bed 
Until the bride shall come! " 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 3 1 
XXXVI. 

Thus did Ulrica sit and sit, 

While many a shout was raised, 
And many a signal lamp was lit, 

And many a bonfire blazed, — 
Till, falling in a fainting fit, 
She woke as one of wandering wit, — 

As one whose mind was dazed. 



XXXVII. 

Sir Hildebrand was on the rack, 
And scowled with many a frown, 

And cursed the bride who came not back 
To don her wedding gown, 

And swore the day of doom should crack 

Ere he would follow on her track 
A rood from Stuttgart town. 



32 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

XXXVIII. 

He stamped his foot in pride and pique, 
And smote his sworded hip, — 

Enraged to lose by fortune's freak 
A prize within his grip, — 

And watched Ulrica, white and weak, 

And muttered what he dared not speak, 
And bit his nether lip. 



xxxix. 

" Pale maid," Sir Hildebrand then said, 

" At last the people think 
Thy mother hath been three days dead ; 

For, though none saw her sink, 
Yet, on the morn she should have wed, 
The footprints of a woman led 

Straight to the river's brink. 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 33 

XL. 

" The Neckar's flood is cold and deep, 

And is thy mother's tomb ; 
She will not waken from her sleep ; 

Thou canst not change her doom ; 
Why shouldst thou any longer weep ? 
Let us the marriage revels keep, 

Let us be bride and groom ! " 



XLI. 

" O traitor to my mother's shade, 
What tempt'st thou me to do ? 

Go thou and lie where she is laid, 
And let me lie there too ! 

But while I live, I live a maid, — 

Who nevermore shall be betrayed,- 
Whom never man shall woo ! " 



34 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

XLII. 

" Lord of thy heart, am I !" quoth he ; 

" Then why not of thy hand? 
Fair lily, thou thyself shalt be 

The bride of Hildebrand ! " 
But when the maiden spurned his plea, 
The baffled suitor crossed the sea, 

And sought the Holy Land. 



XLIII. 

Within her virgin solitude, — 

Her fever burning high, — 
Its flame unquenched although bedewed 

With tears that would not dry, — 
Ulrica pushed away her food, 
And clasped and kissed the Holy Rood, 

And prayed that she might die. 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 35 

XLIV. 

Disrobed of all her silk and lace 

And beautiful attire, 
She wore a hair-cloth in their place, 

That set her flesh on fire ; 
And over all her head and face, 
For penance, and for hope of grace, 

She wore a web of wire. 



XLV. 

The web was woven like a net, 
And narrow was its mesh, 

And close against her cheeks it set 
And, when she wept afresh, 

Tears watered it and kept it wet — 

Until, with many a bloody sweat, 
It rusted on her flesh. 



36 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

XLVI. 

The torture which her penance wrought 

Wore her to skin and bone ! 
She deemed her pardon could be bought 

At such a price alone ! 
" Poor child ! " the pitying people thought, 
" She honoreth as no daughter ought 

A mother basely flown." 



XLVII. 

For swiftly ran a rumor wild 
That now the widowed dame 

Was heavy with an unborn child, 
And fled to hide her shame ; 

And many sneered, — and others smiled,— 

And whom she most had blessed, reviled 
The honor of her name. 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 37 

XLVIII. 

Some said that, tempted by a witch, 

She made a devil's pact 
To drown her baby in a ditch, 

And that her soul was racked 
With many a hellish twinge and twitch 
For shame that she, so high and rich, 

Should sink to such an act. 



XLIX. 

Then cried aloud the maiden mad, 
" Ye know not what ye say ! 

How can a mother's heart be bad ? 
The Lord, to whom ye pray, 

Himself no purer mother had 

Than mine who keeps my soul so sad 
Because she hides away ! 



38 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 



" So cast for me a silver bell, 
That clear its^ound may be, 

And lift it high, and hang it well, 
With hammer swinging free, 

Until my mother in her dell 

Shall hear it over field and fell 
And hasten back to me ! 



LI. 

" But lest my mother take affright, 
And hide in copse or croft, 

The hammer, when she hears it smite, 
Must echo sweet and soft, 

And I alone upon the height, 

At middle eve and middle night, 
Must ring the bell aloft. 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 39 

LII. 

" Black though the summer's gust appear. 

Or white the winter's drift, 
Yet I will climb without a fear 

The top of yonder Stift, 
And every night of all the year 
Will ring and ring till she shall hear 

And hasten to her shrift." 



LIII. 

" Thine is a pretty whim ! " quoth they, 

" And we, at thy desire, 
Will dig a mould-pit in the clay, 

And build a furnace fire, — 
And thou, upon St. Agnes' day, 
Shalt come, and bring a scale, and weigh 

The silver we require." 



40 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

LIV. 

She weighed to them her silver belt, 

Her silver bracelets twain, 
The crucifix to which she knelt, 

Her silver comb and chain, 
Her bowls and flagons — all to melt ; 
And they who took her treasures, felt 

A pity for her pain. 



LV. 

But why she gave, with lavish hand, 

And penitential zest, 
Each silver bodkin, brooch, and band 

Of all that she possessed, 
Except the dirk of Hildebrand, — 
None ever seemed to understand — 

None ever asked or guessed. 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 4 1 

LVI. 

Yet afterward they often told 

How through her web of wire 
She saw the silver crushed and rolled 

And molten in the fire, 
And gazed until the bell grew cold, 
And watched it taken from the mould 

And lifted to the spire. 



LVII. 

Then all the people saw the sight 
Whereof the minstrels tell, — 

How, holding in her hand a light, 
Which on her visor fell, 

She slowly clambered, flight by flight, 

The stairway up the towering height, 
And rang the silver bell. 



42 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

LVIII. 

But while it made as clear a clang 

As ever thrilled the air, — 
And pious listeners, as it rang, 

Were moved to praise and prayer, — 
Tears to Ulrica's eyelids sprang, 
Because it soothed no single pang 

Of her who rang it there. 



LIX. 

Yet, though urtsolaced by its sound, 

She rang it all the same ; 
And ever as the night came round, 

Ulrica also came, — 
Her face within her visor bound, — 
Till such a penance, so renowned, 

Spread wide her saintly fame. 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 43 

LX. 

The crowd, who watched her, might believe 

That on her windy height 
Her flickering lamp, her flowing sleeve, 

Her glimmering robe of white, 
Were but a phantom to deceive, — 
Until she rang at middle eve, 

And rang at middle night. 



LXI. 

Sometimes upon her turret high, 
When nine o'clock had passed, 

She lingered looking at the sky, 
Or on the forest vast, 

Or listened to the owlet's cry, 

And waited till the hours went by, 
And midnight came at last. 



44 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

LXII. 

When she had rung her midnight peal, 
And both her tasks were done, 

She still would tarry, and would kneel, 
And tears would, one by one, 

Round both her burning eyeballs steal ; — 

And, through her haircloth, she would feel 

Her very life blood run. 



LXIIL 

In all the vigils that she kept, 

Ulrica watched alone ; 
And when she prayed, and when she wept, 

No mortal heard the moan ; 
And all night long she never slept, 
And never spake a word except 

To God upon His throne ! 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 45 

LXIV. 
The kindly burghers grieved at first 

To see this lily-flower 
Exposed where winds were at their worst, 

And oft to sleet and shower, 
And would have held her if they durst, — 
But, breaking loose, away she burst 

And nightly climbed the tower. 



LXV. 
At last they let her have her will, 

Nor tried to stay her hand ; — 
And seeing her so frail and ill, 

With hardly strength to stand, 
And shivering if the dews were chill,- 
They praised her pious toil until 

The marvel filled the land. 



46 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

LXVI. 
Then, stricken down, and sore distressed, 

And on her dying bed, — 
The haircloth still around her breast, 

The wire about her head, — 
Ulrica groaned and could not rest, 
And cried that she must be confessed, 

And called a priest, and said : 



LXVII. 
" O man of God, I sinned a sin, 

But now my soul is pure ! 
My heart is clean and white within, 

And my forgiveness sure ! 
This cloth of fire hath burnt my skin- 
This veil of wire hath worn me thin— 

I cannot long endure. 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 47 
LXVIII. 

" The hour is come when I must die, 

And die I gladly will, 
For I in holy church shall lie, — 

Yet out upon the hill 
My mother, through the wet and dry, t 
And under all the chilly sky, 

Will go unshriven still ! 



LXIX. 

" So ring the bell until she hears 
And finds her homeward way ! 

Oh ! ring it till she quells her fears, 
And ventures back to pray ! 

Oh ! ring it for a thousand years, 

Until the Lord Himself appears 
And brings the Judgment Day! 



48 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

LXX. 
" My mother, when she hears it knoll, 

Will come, though I depart ! 
I did not slay my mother's soul — 

I only stabbed her heart ! 
Her blood would hardly fill a bowl ! 
My mother's soul is sound and whole! 

Why do you stare and start ? 



LXXI. 

" What though I hid her in the wood, 
Have I not toiled, and striven, 

And done the best a daughter could 
To call her to be shriven ? 

O mother, mother, sweet and good, 

Have I not suffered as I should, 
And am I not forgiven ?" 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 49 

LXXII. 

With holy sacrament consoled, 

She turned her to the wall, 
And died, — and left a will enscrolled 

Which gave her worldly all, — 
Her land, her castle, and her gold, — 
That twice the bell be nightly knolled 

Until the tower should fall. 



LXXIII. 

The priest who heard Ulrica's tale, 

And*held Ulrica's hand, 
Was once a warrior who, in mail, 

Through all the Holy Land, 
Had fought until his foes would quail 
And at his very name turn pale ; — 

It was Sir Hildebrand. 



50 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART 

LXXIV. 

She did not know the wandering Friar 
With shaven face and crown, 

And since he came in poor attire, 
With thin and threadbare gown, 

And sandals grimy with the mire, — 

No tongue was curious to inquire 
What brought him to the town. 



LXXV. 

Some rudely asked him what he heard, 
That he should shudder so ? 

And why with horror was he stirred 
At such a saintly woe ? 

But since he answered not a word, 

Nor left the truth to be inferred, 
They sought in vain to know. 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 5 1 

LXXVI. 

The manly Monk would not defame 

The maiden of his love, 
Nor cloud her memory with a shame 

The world knew nothing of, 
But left the burden of her blame 
To him from whom her pardon came, — 

The pitying God above. 



LXXVII. 

Ulrica's lowly marble bed 

Was knelt to as a shrine, 
And she was sainted, like the dead 

Whose lives have been divine ; 
And holy haloes — it was said — 
Came up like flames above her head, 

Around her tomb to shine. 



52 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

LXXVIII. 

They now are quenched and flicker not ; 

Nor can the verger say- 
That here or yonder is the spot 

Wherein she lies or lay ; 
For marble suffereth rust and rot, 
And tombs and tenants are forgot, 
And both alike decay. 



LXXIX. 

The castle crumbled ere its time 
Through siege and sack and rout ; 

And cut away were larch and lime, 
That wooded it about ; 

And in the wood a pool of slime, — 

That long had hid Ulrica's crime, — 
Then cast the secret out. 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 53 

LXXX. 

A woman's corpse was dragged to light, 
Whose heart's blood had been spilt, — 

For in the breast, — O woeful sight ! — 
Lay buried to the hilt 

A silver dirk, whose handle bright 

Bore letters that proclaimed outright 
Ulrica's name and guilt. 



LXXXI. 

Her bloody deed by speech and rhyme 
Through all the town was blazed ; 

Where hearts that beat in after time 
Shall quake at it amazed; 

For all who hear Ulrica's chime 

Shall learn her tale of love and crime, 
And how her wit was crazed. 



54 THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 

LXXXII. 

Yet none shall wonder any more 

Why round her tender frame 
She wrapped the robe that pricked and tore 

And set her flesh aflame, 
Or why upon her brow she bore 
The torturing crown of penance sore, 

To purge away her blame. 



LXXXIII. 

Ulrica's bell could never bring 

Her mother to be shriven, 
Yet as it rang so let it ring, 

That warning may be given 
How wounded love will turn and sting, 
And like a wild and furious thing 

Will rend as it is riven ! 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART. 55 

LXXXIV. 

Through summer's heat and winter's cold, 

From seed-time to the flail, 
The tocsin, from its bleak stronghold, 

By night, to hill and vale, 
With silver tongue, as first of old, 
For full five hundred years hath told 

The maiden's mournful tale. 



LXXXV. 

Perchance, above the city's street, 

Above the church's wall, 
The silver hammer still shall beat, 

And out of heaven shall call, 
And for a thousand years repeat 
The tale and warning, clear and sweet, 

Until the tower shall fall ! 



THE ROMANCE OF THE RO- 
THENBERG. 



THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 

A.D. 1819-1864. 



I. 

Aloft, where the Swabian hill-tops are serried, 
The Swabians carried their king to be buried ; 
His tomb on the Rothenberg high 
Is capped by the clouds of the sky. 



II. 

Not first for himself did he fashion and build it ; 

The bride of his youth was the tenant who filled 

it— 

Ere he, in his age, when he died, 

Was carried and laid at her side. 

59 



60 THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 

III. 

He built it for love, yet it blazons his glory ; 
For all who behold it, or hear of the story, 
^Give honor, as honor is due, 
To love and a lover so true. 



IV. 

His castles may crumble, his bridges grow rotten, 
His laws and his statecraft may all be forgotten ; 

The thoughts of the world are on things 

More vital than ashes of kings. 



V. 

The past is a dream, and is dim to the present ; 

Yet never shall Swabia's noble or peasant 
Forget, while her hills are green, 
The love of the king for the queen. 



THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 6 1 

VI. 

So list to the tale of the sepulcher's founder, 
How William, who wedded Katrina, and crowned 
her, 

Adored, in the queen on the throne, 

The saintliest wife ever known. 

VII. 
She prayed, and gave alms, till the needy and 

lowly 
Declared that a princess, so humble and holy, 
Around her, wherever she passed, 
The odor of sanctity cast. 

VIII. 
The king, of a different metal was moulded ; 
He laughed, and he revelled ; he swore, and he 
scolded; 
He boasted of having no taint 
That likened him unto a saint. 



62 THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 

IX. 

It never is strange in a roystering sinner 

To love a good woman, and woo her, and win her 

And well knew the monarch the worth 

Of such a good angel on earth. 



X. 

O death, in thy havoc, how seldom thou sparest 
The noblest and brightest, the sweetest and rarest ! 

How often thy cruellest dart 

Flies first at the kindliest heart ! 



XI. 

The queen, in her palace, was mortally stricken ; 

The king, in his anguish at seeing her sicken, 
Kept hoping, yet hoping in vain, 
And writhed with a passionate pain. 






THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 63 

XII. 

To love and to lose is the loss of losses ; 
To love and to lose is the cross of crosses ; 

The shadow of death must fall 

On hovel and kingly hall. 



XIII. 

As pale as the pillow whereon she was lying, 
" My liege," said the queen, on the day of her 
dying, 

" In death I shall be, as in life, 

Forever and ever your wife. 



XIV. 

" Wherever you lay me, continue to love me, 
And if there shall ever be marble above me, 
O promise me now, on your oath, 
One tomb shall be built for us both. 



64 THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 

XV. 

" Make choice of a resting place, quiet and lonely, 
Where we two together, — we twain, and we only, — 

Far off from the other dead, — 

May lie in the self-same bed. 

XVI. 

" Though long be the years you may linger behind 

me, 
Yet seek me at last, and be certain to find me, 

And mingle with mine your clay, 

To wait for the Judgment Day." 

XVII. 
The king, at her bedside, with sighing and sob- 
bing, 
With hand on his heart that was brokenly throb- 
bing, 
The pledge of his honor gave 
To sleep in Katrina's grave. 



THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 65 

XVIII. 

Aloft, where the clouds on the Rothenberg rested, 
He made her a grave where the eagles had nested ; 

A sepulcher high on a hill, 

Where all but the wind was still. 



XIX. 

Encircling the summit whereon she reposes, 
He planted a hedgerow of lilies and roses, 

And built, in a girdle of bloom, 

A temple to cover her tomb. 



XX. 

High over the dome, and afar beholden, 
There glitters a cross with a luster golden, — 
A cross that forever shines 
On twenty green valleys of vines. 



66 THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 

XXI. 

The stork, from the village, if weary of flying, 
Will tarry to rest where Katrina is lying, 

And perch on the holy rood, 

And sleep in the solitude. 



XXII. 

Within is a chapel, with chancel and altar ; 
And thrice in a year, with a censer and psalter, 

A priest, at the break of day, 

Goes thither to kneel and pray. 



XXIII. 

Whenever, at matins, he chants the Te Deum, 
The melody floats from the mausoleum 

As over the desert is borne 

The music of Memnon at morn. 



THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 6? 
XXIV. 

Writ over the sepulcher's ponderous portal 
Are letters to teach that the soul is immortal, 

And love, as the Scriptures say, 

Endureth forever and aye. 



XXV. 

If ever the dead have the gift of divining, 
This luminous hope to Katrina was shining,- 
As haply a sunbeam had slipped 
From heaven down into her crypt. 



XXVI. 

The king, though he mourned her, yet very soon 

after 
Went back to his flagon, his dance, and his laughter, 

And played at the perilous sport 

Of smiling on dames of his court. 



6S THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 

XXVII. 

What wonder, when ladies of folly and fashion 
So basked in the smile of a sovereign's passion, 

That some, as the stories go, 

Said oftener yes than no ? 



XXVIII. 

But fancy, though fond of a new direction, 
Is prone to return to its first affection ; 

The heart of the king lay hid 

Deep under a coffin's lid. 



XXIX. 

The love of his youth was a love so lasting, 
That even the shadow which death was casting 

Quenched not th' immortal gleam 

And glory of love's first dream. 



THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 69 

XXX. 

The love that is first is the love that is longest ; 
The love that is first is the love that is strongest 

For longer than life is its length ; 

And stronger than death is its strength. 



XXXI. 

The king, with his ladies, was tempted to love them, 
Yet ever there hovered an image above them, 

Which beckoned him back as he strayed, 

And which he adored and obeyed. 



XXXII. 

When honor grew weaker, and passion grew 

stronger, 
The vision, although it restrained him no longer, 

Still followed wherever he went, 

And chid him to turn and repent. 



JO THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 

XXXIII. 

At length, when the critical tongues were clamorous, 
And dared to rebuke him for being amorous, 

They stung him to sudden shame 

By naming his dead wife's name. 



xxxiv. 

The king, in his conscience, was nettled and harried 
He ended the gossip and suddenly married ; 

Yet after the wedding he still 

Went weeping to Rothenberg hill. 



XXXV. 

In camp, or in chase, or in merry-making, 
He still had a heart that was always aching, 
And, though he was newly wed, 
Had only a wife who was dead. 



THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 71 

XXXVI. 
When flagons were flowing, and guests were ca- 
rousing, 
The king, with his head on his breast, would be 
drowsing, 
And suddenly wake with a sigh, 
From dreaming of days gone by. 

XXXVII. 

He rollicked and frolicked from midnight till 

morrow, 
Yet ever he cherished his love and his sorrow ; 

And what though his revels were great, ' 

His duty was done to the State. 

XXXVIII. 
A king, yet a lover of liberty ever, 
He wrought for his country with busy endeavor, — 

And proudly the chronicles say 

He never was idle a day. 



72 THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 

XXXIX. 

From morning till night he was building a highway, 
Or planting a garden, or tracing a byway, 

Or marking a terraced ridge, 

Or flinging the arch of a bridge. 



XL. 

No minion or drudge of the palace or castle, 
No dresser of vineyards, no henchman or vassal, 

No delver or son of the soil 

Outrivaled the monarch in toil. 



XLI. 

He hid in the scabbard the sword and the sabre 
He took for his sceptre the hammer of labor ; 
And, doffing his helm and his plume, 
He ruled by the plough and the loom. 



THE ROMANCE OF 'THE ROTHENBERG. 73 

XLII. 

He traversed his kingdom from centre to border ; 
He lifted its burdens, he settled its order ; 

Not boasting of blood that he spilt, 

But proud of the cities he built. 



XLIII. 

Yet more than the building of turret or steeple, 
The pride of the king was to build up his people, 

And leave, as the work of his hand, 

A happy and prosperous land. 



XLIV. 

He won his reward in the love of the nation, 
Till pillar and statue and festal ovation 
Bore witness, in city and town, 
How well he had worn the crown. 



74 THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 

XLV. 

At last as a patriarch, feeble and hoary,. 

He bade a farewell to his splendor and glory, 
And gave, with his dying tones, 
Commandment concerning his bones. 



XLVI. 

He gave his decree with a tranquil decision, 
And looked, as he spake, as if seeing a vision ; 

And lustre was in his eye 

As if he were glad to die. 



XLVII. 

He talked of Katrina, and how he had told her 
That both of their bodies together should moulder ; 
And bade that his corpse, in the night, 
Be carried to Rothenberg height ; — 



THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 7$ 

XLVIII. 
And there, without trapping or pompous adorning, 
His pall should be spread till the dawn of the 
morning ; — 
And then, at a cannon's boom, 
The lid should be shut on the tomb. 

XLIX. 
The people, who bore him with tears to his slumber 
Forgot that his faults were a legion in number, — 

Or chid him with gentle blame, 

As if in Katrina's name. 

L. 

Through fifty long years he had lingered behind 

her, 
Ere up through the darkness he journeyed to find 
her ; 
But, true to the promise he gave, 
He lies in Katrina's grave. 



?6 THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 

LI. 

Serene on their Swabian height together, 
They sleep through the thunderous Alpine 
weather, — 
Awaiting, aloft in the skies, 
The day when the dead shall arise. 






THE FATE OF FRISCHLIN. 



THE FATE OF FRISCHLIN. 

A. D. I59O. 



I WANDERED far, with happy feet, 

In lands beyond the sea, 
Through forest dim, and meadow sweet, 

And haunt of bird and bee, 
And found the greenest spot of all 
By Urach's whispering waterfall. 



The ruins of a castle old 

Crown Hohen Urach's height, 

Where many a robber baron bold 
Fought many a lawless fight, — 

Though now the brawler and the brawl 

Are in oblivion, one and all. 

79 



80 THE FATE OF FRISCHLIN. 

But pilgrims, as they climb the hill 

To overlook the vale, 
Repeat the name of Frischlin still, 

And tell the piteous tale 
Of how the captive singer sweet 
Loved Swabia, and loved Marguerite. 

That was his country, this his wife ; 

For, with a lover's oath, 
The poet pledged his heart and life 

With equal vow to both, 
And both he loved with equal fire, 
And both he honored with his lyre. 

Dame Marguerite had golden hair, 
And when it was unbound 

It streamed upon the windy air, 
Or trailed upon the ground, 

Or, if she braided it instead, 

It four times wound around her head. 



THE FATE OF FRISCHLIN. Si 

She was a matron fair to see, 

A wife whose heart was kind, 
And, what a poet's mate should be, 

A comrade of his mind, 
And often by the mountain brook 
They sat and read the self-same book. 

For whether it were Christian tome, 

Or Talmud of the Jew, 
Or pagan lay of Greece or Rome, 

Or fable old or new, 
Yet side by side they read the scroll, 
Till twain grew one in mind and soul. 

Fate severed them by bolt and bar, 

By stony wall and door ; 
For luckless was a poet's star, 

Who smote in days of yore 
His ringing harp with daring hand 
Against the tyrants of the land. 

4* 



82 THE FATE OF FRISCHLIN. 

Brave Frischlin, with a soul free-born, 

Defiant of his fate, 
And ever answering scorn with scorn, 

And rendering hate for hate, 
Cared little though his word might sting 
The duke, the margrave, or the king. 

Though others cringed, and others knelt, 

And others wore the yoke, 
His heart was of the few that felt, 

His mouth the one that spoke ; 
But woe to him whose wit is free, 
And speaks against the powers that be ! 

A tongue that smiteth like a sword, 

What despot can endure ? 
The poet lashed each haughty lord 

Who trampled on the poor ; 
And since he told the truth so well, 
They bade him tell it in a cell ! 



THE FATE OF FRISCHLIN. 83 

No dungeon was it under ground, 

But half way up the sky ; 
Nor needed it a moat profound, 

Since from his window high 
He watched the cattle come and go 
That browsed a thousand feet below. 

Imprisoned in the upper air, 

He wistfully looked down 
Until the dame of golden hair 

Looked upward from the town ; 
And often as their glances met, 
They knew each other's eyes were wet. 

The livelong summer rolled away, 

And wintry tempests blew, 
And flying clouds made dark the day, 

And hazes hid the view, 
And weary grew each lover's lot, 
Who gazed yet saw the other not. 



84 THE FATE OF FRISCHLIN. 

Three days and nights there fell a snow, 

That drifted in its fall, 
Till round the ledge, that from below 

Held up the castle wall, 
The drift, so feathery and so deep, 
Lay soft upon the jagged steep. 

The captive, from his lofty tower, 
Looked down the snow-clad height, 

Till in the stormy midnight hour 
He saw a chance of flight ; 

For what will not a captive dare, 

Inspired by frenzy and despair ? 

The scanty blankets of his bed, 
He tore with teeth and hands, 

And, strip by strip, and shred by shred, 
He tied them into strands, 

And twined the strands into a rope, 

Whereon to hang a prisoner's hope. 



THE FATE OF FRISCHLIN. 8$ 

The sentry, as he paced his round 

Upon the rampart high, 
Or as he stopped to hear the sound 

Of gusts that rattled by, 
Heard not the prisoner's muffled stroke, 
That beat his bars until they broke. 

Nor saw he on the dangling cord 

The prisoner's dauntless self, 
Who swung to every gust that roared 

Above the rocky shelf, 
And tried in vain to find a place 
For foothold on its slippery base. 

Perhaps the line was not of length 

To reach the jutting ledge, — 
Or else was frayed beyond its strength 

Against the cutting edge, — 
The fragile thread bore not his weight, 
But broke and dashed him to his fate. 



86 THE FATE OF FRISCHLIN. 

From rock to rock he slipped and fell, — 
Down, down a thousand feet, — 

Till, at the bottom of the dell, 
The snow, — his winding sheet, 

That gathered round him as he went, — 

With many a blood-stain was besprent. 

The peasants say, there since have grown 

Strange flowers upon the spot, 
And many a maiden comes alone 

To see, but pluck them not ; 
And when she hears the wind go by, 
She calls it Marguerite's sad sigh. 

Some say that happy Marguerite, 

With pardon from the king, 
Toiled through the drift, with cumbered feet, 

(Yet heart upon the wing) 
Until she saw the snow blood-red, 
And stood aghast before the dead ! 






THE FATE OF FR1SCHLIN. 8? 

Her shriek rose through the tempest loud, 

And in the snow she prayed 
That she too, in a whiter shroud, 

Beside him might be laid ; 
Then, frozen in her swoon, she died, 
And both were buried side by side. 

Within the churchyard where they lie, 

No marble marks the place; 
But under rose-trees, lush and high, 

They rest in close embrace, — 
Where heaven, to mark a love so true, 
Forbids the sun to dry the dew. 

A crumbled heap of stones and lime 

Are Hohen Urach's walls, — 
A beauteous ruin, as in time, 

Shall be all tyrants' halls ! — 
And nought preserves the castle's fame 
Except alone its captive's name. 



88 THE FATE OF FRISCHLIN. 

The singer perished, but his song — 

As of a mountain bird — 
Went on re-echoing loud and long, 

And through the land was heard, 
Till they who heard it, rose and broke, 
In Freedom's name, the tyrant's yoke. 

And so, though Hohen Urach's tower 
Was once so proud and strong, 

Yet, greater than the despot's power 
Became the poet's song ; 

For never can a tyrant stand 

Against a minstrel of the land. 

What nobler soul on earth can be, 
Or in the heavens above, 

Than one who lives for liberty 
And one who dies for love ? 

And since this nobleness was thine, 

Accept, O Bard, this lay of mine! 



THE ASS OF HOHEN NEUFEN. 



THE ASS OF HOHEN NEUFEN. 

A.D. 1275. 
I. 

On Hohen Neufen's castled mount 
There bubbled once a sparkling fount, 

Now choked by tangled grass ; 
And, though the sentries of the foe 
Kept watch from all the plain below, 

None saw the mountain-pass 

Through which the water-casks were borne 

From fount to castle, everf^norn, 

Upon a milk-white ass. 

91 



92 THE ASS OF HO HEN NEUFEN. 

II. 

Who led him to and from the place ? 
It was the pearl of all her race, — 

Fair Vola, she whose sire 
Denied her hand to one whose birth 
Was noble as his manly worth ; 

Whereat, with youthful ire, 
Her warlike lover, with his train, 
Had come by night and lit the plain 

With many a bivouac fire. 

III. 
Count Berthold, in his white old age, 
Then said with all the testy rage 

That frets an aged breast : 
" My daughter is my only one ; 
Her lover shall not be my son ; 

For Guy of Teck loves best — 
Not Vola's heart, nor Vola's hand — 
But Vola's title to her land, 

Twelve leagues from south to west. 



THE ASS OF HO HEN NEUFEN. 93 

IV. 
" Though I be old, and soon to die, 

Yet mine is still my castle high ; 

And though the Triple Fates, 
And all the Furies, fierce and fell, 
And Prince Apollyon, hot from hell, 

With all his fiery mates, 
Should beard me in my lofty den, 
Yet I, with half my hundred men, 

Would still defend my gates ! " 

V. 
Thought Guy of Teck : " I know a power 
To humble yonder lofty tower, 

However strong and proud ; 
For, though it stands on such a height 
That oft it fadeth from my sight, — 

Hid by a passing cloud, — 
Yet Hunger climbs the highest walls, 
And Famine soon shall haunt those halls, 

Until the brave are cowed. 



94 THE ASS OF HO HEN NEUFEN. 

VI. 

" Besides, on such a craggy brink, 
What can the bowmen have to drink ? 

What water, or what wine? 
Of all the foes of man, the worst 
(As every soldier knows) is thirst ! 

Think how those heroes pine ! 
Think how in feverish, mocking dreams 
They pant for their familiar streams, — 

The Neckar and the Rhine ! " 

VII. 

Pale Vola wrung her helpless hands, 
And wept to see a foeman's bands 

Her father's tower surround ; 
But since she loved her lover well, 
How could her maiden's pride but swell 

To see the vale profound 
Starred by his squadrons, far and near? 
How could her soul but thrill to hear 

His martial trumpets sound ? 



THE ASS OF HOHEN NEUFEN. 95 

VIII. 

The patient ass, that came and went, 
Knew little what the trumpets meant, 

Or why the maid shed tears, 
Or why she often stroked his side, 
Or mounted on his back to ride, 

Or whispered in his ears 
And asked him if he dared at night 
Go down from Hohen Neufen's height 

To yonder foeman's spears. 

IX. 
The siege went on from day to day 
Till half the summer slipt away, — 

Yet not a shot was fired ; 
And barriers on the plain were built 
Where Teck, for pastime, rode at tilt, — 

In glittering mail attired ; 
While hungry men to Berthold went 
To say the castle-stores were spent, 

And food was now required. 



g6 THE ASS OF HO HEN NEUFEN. 

X. 

Old Berthold to the murmurers said : 
" Ye cowards, come ye here for bread ? 

How dare ye quit your post? 
Not Guy of Teck, with all his throng, 
Can take a tower so high and strong ; 

I fear not all his host ; 
I fear but ye, O men of mine, 
Who, just for lack of bread and wine, 

Are giving up the ghost ! " 

XI. 

He flung to them an ear of wheat ; 

" Take each a grain," quoth he, " and eat, 

And base will be the knave 
Who every morn can drink his fill 
Of water from our mountain rill, 

Brought sparkling from the cave, 
Yet who, for lack of crumb or crust, 
Would crouch before the foe in dust, 

And yield himself a slave ! 



THE ASS OF HOHEN NEUFEN. 97 

XII. 
" My daughter shrinks not from her task 

Of bringing us our water-cask ; 

And, though of high degree, 
She serves us like a lowly maid ! 
O ye faint-hearted and afraid, 

Who tremble in the knee, 
Pluck back your courage once again, 
And be ye brave, if not as men, 

Yet as a maid can be ! " 

XIII. 

Fair Vola, from her turret high, 
Would watch her lover's pennon fly, 

Or, if the mists were dense, 
Or rains begirt her mountain height, 
And hid him from her straining sight, 

Would turn her eyes from thence, 
And in the ass's copious ears 
Confess her love with smiles and tears, — 

As if the brute had sense. 



98 THE ASS OF HOHEN NEUFEN. 

XIV. 
(No doubt the creature's sense was small ;' 
For, to an ass, no sense at all 

Men jeeringly ascribe ; 
Yet since it often comes to pass 
That man is like the very ass 

At whom he flings his jibe, 
Perhaps proud man may merely be 
An ass superior in degree, — 

Chief donkey of his tribe !) 

XV. 
The cliff which Berthold's castle crowned 
Had little space for pasture ground ; 

Yet on the height superb — 
Serene beneath the sky's blue vault, — 
And which the foe, by no assault, 

Had ventured to disturb — 
The gentle ass had room to browse, 
And crop the leaves and drooping boughs, 

And many a forest herb. 



THE ASS OF HOHEN NEUFEN. 99 

XVI. 

When Berthold's hundred hungry men 
Grew gaunt within their prison pen, 

And showed the hollow cheek, 
And all were worn to skin and bone, — 

Except the favored ass alone, 

Who grew more plump and sleek, — 
The soldiers shouted, " we will slay 
That fattened beast, this very day, 

And live on him a week ! " 

XVII. 

Old Berthold answered, " which is worst — 
To die of hunger, or of thirst ? 

Go kill the ass, who will ! 
But whoso kills the ass, I swear 
Shall be himself the ass to bear 

The water up the hill ! " 
And since no soldier had the nerve 
In such capacity to serve, 

Their threatening tongues grew still. 



100 THE ASS OF HOHEN NEUFEN. 

XVIII. 
A few days after, at the dawn, 
They looked, and lo ! the ass was gone ! 

They searched his empty stall, — 
They searched his airy pasture-ground, — 
They searched the castle, round and round- 
Within, without the wall, — 
But could not find upon the mount, 
Nor in the woods, nor at the fount, 
A trace of him at all. 

XIX. 

None knew the vanished creature's fate, — 
Nor that at night the castle-gate 

Was opened with a key, 
And that fair Vola — russet-clad 
As if she were a peasant lad — 

Had set the creature free, 
And on his back had ridden down 
From Neufen height to Neufen town, — 

For wondrous brave was she ! 



THE ASS OF HOHEN NEUFEN. 101 

XX. 
Why rode she down that lofty height, 
Alone, and at the dead of night, 

Through forests dim and damp, — 
Unguided on her darksome way 
By moon, or star, or any ray 

Except the glow-worm's lamp, — 
Yet lighted by her soul's own fire, 
That led her with a pure desire 

To seek her lover's camp ? 

XXI. 

She was a woman, wise and true, 
And with a woman's wit she knew,— 

Or if she knew not, guessed, — 
That he who loved the daughter so 
Sought not the father's overthrow, 

Nor soilure of his crest, 
But valued more her heart and hand 
Than Hohen Neufen's tower and land, 

And vineyards, south and west. 



102 THE ASS OF HOHEN NEUFEN. 

XXII. 
Why else had such a gallant knight 
Forborne to storm the castle's height ? 

Why had the courtly foe, 
With twenty captains in the field, 
Sat idly by, with sword and shield, 

Nor ever struck a blow? 
He could not mean to scale the wall, 
And were she his for good and all, 

Would raise the siege and go. 

XXIII. 

Right well she knew, her nod and beck 
Were will and law to Guy of Teck ; 

For he had kissed her hand, 
And kissed her brow, and kissed her mouth. 
And not in all the west or south, 

No, not in all the land 
Was there a maid whom he adored 
Save her whom he must woo with sword, 

And win with armed band. 



THE ASS OF HOHEN NEUFEN. -103 

XXIV. 
Forth on the ass, at morn, she went 
To Guy of Teck's pavilioned tent ; — 

And there, in her disguise, 
And blushing with a boyish face, 
She made a curtsy full of grace ; 

And, when he bade her rise, 
She gave into her lover's hand 
A letter by her sire's command, 

With greetings in this wise : 

XXV. 

" Lord Teck, thou art as all men know — 
The son of my most ancient foe, 

With whom I fought of old ; — 
And thou, the heir of his great name, 
Now comest rashly here to claim 

This castle, my stronghold, — 
Which never was thy sire's by right, 
Nor canst thou win it by thy might, 

Nor buy it with thy gold. 



104 THE ASS OF HOHEN NEUFEN. 

XXVI. 
" But woman's love must have its way; 
What sire can say his daughter nay ? 

I am no longer loath 
(If peace betwixt our hosts can be) 
That she who bears this scroll to thee 

Shall take thy ring and oath, 
And Teck and Vola shall be wed, 
And Berthold's castle, Berthold dead, 

Shall be the fief of both." 

XXVII. 
Young Guy of Teck, with lover's eyes, 
Saw through the maiden's rude disguise, 

And waved his knights away, — 
As wishing all alone to speak 
With one so modest and so meek ; 

Yet what had he to say ? 
He mutely clasped her to his breast, 
While she, with tell-tale tears, confessed 

What words could not convey ! 



THE ASS OF HOHEN NEUFEN. 105 

XXVIII. 
" No thicker drops than these," he said, 
" Shall in this strife of ours be shed — 

No blood from any heart ; 
The castled hill, the tented plain 
Shall both be free of gory stain ; 

My army shall depart. 
I seek not yonder pile of stone, — 
I seek but thee, and thee alone, — 

And mine at last thou art ! 

XXIX. 
" So back to Hohen Neufen ride, 
And tell thy sire, O bonny bride, 

That I, his son to be, 
Agree to quench the angry strife ; — 
And when thou art my wedded wife, 

Our castles twain shall see 
Their ancient feud forever cease, 
And there shall reign a sacred peace 

Between thy sire and me." 



106 THE ASS OF HO HEN NEUFEN. 

XXX. 

Then Vola, on the milk-white ass. 
Set forth to thread the mountain-pass, 

That still was wet with dews ; 
And other dews were on her face ; — 
And, all impatient at the pace 

With which she bore her news, 
She switched the ass, nor let him stop 
To bite a thistle, or to crop 

The lindens or the yews. 

XXXI. 
Her lover to his knights explained 
That though he had no battle gained, 

Yet he had won his bride ; 
And that to wage a war alone 
For Hohen Neufen's crown of stone 

Would be a foolish pride, — 
For Berthold now was old and ill, 
And Berthold's fields and castled hill 

Were his when Berthold died. 



THE ASS OF HOHEN NEUFEN. 107 

XXXII. 
Then round the camp a whisper ran, — 
From rank to rank, from man to man, — 

That if so fat a beast 
Had fed on Hohen Neufen's hill, 
The men must feed far better still, 

And like the gods must feast, 
(Who on Olympus scarce fed higher!) 
And that to starve them might require 

A dozen years at least. 

XXXIII. 
They thought it wiser to retreat 
From out the valley and its heat 

Than stay to bake and broil 
Beneath a Swabian summer sun ; 
And, since no victory could be won 

To pay them with its spoil, 
They begged their youthful lord and liege 
To countermand the fruitless siege, 

And end their sweaty toil. 



108 THE ASS OF HOHEN NEUFEN. 

XXXIV. 
" Now God, the Lord of hosts, be praised ! " 
Old Berthold cried, " the siege is raised ! 

The foe hath quit the plain ! 
See how his armies march away ! 
At four-score, I am young to-day ! 

Our honor hath no stain ! 
Be blessings on our daughter's head, 
Who brings us peace and brings us bread ! 

Let joy and plenty reign ! " 

xxxv. 
There was a marriage feast so grand 
That every noble in the land 

Went thither as a guest ; 
And when the beauteous bride was wed, 
The princely bridegroom spake and said ■ 

" Behold, from south to west 
All enmity hath now an end, 
For Teck is Berthold's son and friend, 

And all the land hath rest/' 



THE ASS OF HOHEN NEUFEN. 109 

XXXVI. 
The nuptials were in Neufen town, — 
To which, they say, the bride rode down 

Upon her milk-white beast ; 
And peasants gave the ass a sheaf, 
Made up of every luscious leaf, — 

The largest and the least, — 
That grew on Hohen Neufen's hill ■ 
And like a guest he ate his fill 

At Vola's wedding-feast. 

XXXVII. 

The world, that honors many an ass, 
Then fed him on the public grass, 

Until, in Neufen's vale, — 
In clover to his very knees, — 
With thistle-downs on every breeze, — 

The creature, stout and hale, 
Grew, like an abbot, round of girth, 
And was the greatest ass on earth ; — 

And hereby ends the tale. 



THE MAIDS AND WIVES OF 
WEINSBERG. 



THE MAIDS AND WIVES OF WEINSBERG. 



A. D. 1 140. 



I. 

It happened in the stormy feud 

Of Weiblinger and Welf, 
That Weinsberg town was unsubdued, — 
Although the siege was thrice renewed, 

And by the Kaiser's self. 

II. 

At last the Welf, who had so well 

Beat back the Kaiser's power, 

And whom no sword or fire could quell, 

Was forced by famine, dire and fell, 

To yield his town and tower. 

113 



114 THE MAIDS AND WIVES OF WEINSBERG. 

III. 

"Be death the doom/' the Kaiser cried, 

" Of traitors bold as they, — 
And, since with such a stubborn pride 
They have so long our power defied, 

The dogs shall die to-day ! 

IV. 

" Build twenty gibbets through the town, 

And, in St. Peter's name, 
Hang every mother's son, head down, 
And strip from every dame the gown 

That hides her naked shame! " 

v. 

Now when the herald's trump was blown 

Through street and market-square 
To make the dreadful sentence known, 
All Weinsberg echoed with a groan — 
An outcry of despair. 



THE MAIDS AND WIVES OF WEINSBERG. 115 
VI. 

A woman from the Welf's abode 

Rushed forth into the street, 
Half-veiled, to hide her tears that flowed, 
And, prostrate where the Kaiser rode, 

Fell at his horse's feet. 

VII. 

The Kaiser loved her once, they say, — 

A boyish freak, forsooth, — 
Yet down through many an after day 
A man can keep, as well he may, 

The fancy of his youth. 

VIII. 

Quoth he, " unveil your beauty, rise ! 

I swear, upon my life, 
I know you by your voice and eyes, — 
You are the Duchess in disguise, — 

You are the Welf's own wife ! 



Il6 I HE MAIDS AND WIVES OF WEINSEERG. 

IX. 

" Now, ere you plead, lest I deny, 

Ask nothing for the Welf ; 
He and his guilty gang must die ; — 
But, in the name of days gone by, 

What ask you for yourself ? " 

X. 

Quoth she, " if I were wife to you, 

As I am wife to him, 
I still would pray you to undo 
The death of men so brave and true, — 

To spare them, life and limb. 

XI. 

/ 

" And 0, what honor can you glean, 

Or glory to your crown, 
If I, who might have been your queen, 
With all my women, should be seen 

Sent naked from the town ? 



THE MAIDS AND WIVES OF WEINSBERG. 117 
XII. 

" What wrong have my poor women done — 

What treason, where or when ? 
Not I nor they have fired a gun ; 
The battle which you just have won 

Was fought against our men. 

XIII. 

" Our men are brave, and do not fear 

The gibbet or the ax ; 
But spare to us the scoff — the jeer — 
The passing by your soldiers here 

With nothing on our backs ! " 

XIV. 

The Kaiser, it must be confessed, 

Was of the cynic tribe, 
And it was woman, weak at best, 
At whom he cracked his rudest jest 

And aimed his roughest jibe. 



118 THE MAIDS AND WIVES OF WEINSBERG. 
XV. 

" Is woman's vanity so great," 

Quoth he, "that burning town, 
And pillaged house, and death-doomed mate 
Forbid not woman's tongue to prate 
Of frock and smock and gown ? 

XVI. 

" Well, then, in Weinsberg be it told 

I grant a woman's prayer ; 
Let all the women, young and old, 
Go forth, with all their arms can hold — 

And all their backs can bear ! " 

XVII. 

The Duchess ran to all her sex, 

And whispered as she ran : 
" Flee from the ruins and the wrecks — 
But save your lords' and lovers' necks — 

Each woman take a man ! " 



THE MAIDS AND WIVES OF WEINSBERG. 119 
XVIII. 

The people, though in anguish, laughed 

On hearing of her scheme, 
And said the Duchess must be daft 
To hope to overcome by craft 

A sovereign so supreme. 

XIX. 

O woman, trust the Triple Fates ! 

For, of the sisters three, 
Each, with a woman's instinct, hates 
All women's foes, and kindly waits 

On every woman's plea. 

xx. 

Although the town was given to sack, 

Yet, with a throbbing breast, 
Each woman bore upon her back, 
Or in her arms, through smoke and wrack, 

The man she loved the best. 



120 THE MAIDS AND WIVES OF WEINSBERG. 
XXI. 

* 

The Duchess first, with might and main, 

Upbore the Duke himself, — 
And every woman of her train 
Took up her blessing or her bane, 

And saved a manly Welf. 

XXII. 

The Kaiser, though by craft beguiled, 

Was not to vengeance stirred, 
And watched the train as it defiled, 
Nor stopped it, saying as he smiled : 
" A Kaiser keeps his word." 

XXIII. 

It was a panting, sweating throng, 

That staggered in its march ; 
Yet love can make the weakest strong ; 
And so the women toiled along 

From market-place to arch. 



THE MAIDS AND WIVES OF WEINSBERG. 121 
XXIV. 

The soldiers cheered their passing by, — 
And foe was changed to friend, — 

And shouts of laughter rent the sky ; — 

Nor shall the merry echo die 
Until the world shall end. 



THE RAGGED BARD OF RAMBIN. 



THE RAGGED BARD OF RAMBIN. 



[When the Baltic was called the Swabian Sea, the ancient village 
of Rambin, on the island of Rtigen, was popularly thought to be 
a haunt of fairies, gnomes, and elves.] 



I. 

Ere pious King Olaf 

Put under a ban 
The pixies and fairies 

(If kings ever can), 
An elf and a harper 

Were master and man. 



125 



126 THE RAGGED BARD OF RAMBIN. 

II. 

Although in the caverns, 

And under the crags, 
The elfin had treasures 

In boxes and bags, 
The bard was a beggar 

And always in rags. 

III. 
" Good elf," quoth the poet, 

" Thy bounty is free, 
And many the boon 

Thou hast granted to me, 
But still I am needy, 

As poets must be. 

IV. 
" Three treasures I beg for, 

O bountiful elf, — 
A wreath of green laurel, 

A purse full of pelf, 
A bride who in beauty 

Is beauty itself." 



THE RAGGED BARD OF RAMBIN. 12? 
V. 

" O beggar, thou comest 

As oft as the moon ! 
I gave thee thy harp, 

And thy staff, and thy shoon ! 
Who giveth too often 

Belittles the boon. 

VI. 

" The laurel thou seekest 

Must grow with thy song : 
At fair and at market 

Go thrum to the throng ; 
If few be the plaudits, 

Jog further along. 

VII. 

" The pelf thou implorest 

Would buy thee a curse ; 
Thy gold and thy jewels 

Are best in thy verse ; 
Yet here is a penny 

To put in thy purse. 



128 THE RAGGED BARD OF R A MB IN. 

VIII. 

" The bride thou desirest 

To-night shall be thine, — 
A fairy of Elfland., 

A daughter of mine, 
Too fair for thy seeing 

By sight of the eyne." 

IX. 

The bard took the penny 
And bought him his bread ; 

He sang himself weary, 

. And pillowed his head ; 

He slept, and a maiden 
Bent over his bed. 

x. 

She dawned on his vision 

At dead of the night ; 
She danced on his eyelids 

With feet of a sprite ; 
She vanished to Elfland 

At peep o' the light. 



THE RAGGED BARD OF RAMBIN. 1 29 

XI. 

Next morning the minstrel 

Went forth on his way ; 
He harped and he chanted, 

And sweet was his lay ; 
His vision by night 

Was his carol by day. 
XII. 

But small was the guerdon 

He got for his hire ; 
" Begone ! " cried the idlers, 

" Away with thy lyre ! — 
Thy strain is too lofty — 

We weary and tire ! " 

XIII. 

He sang to the reapers 

Who gathered their grain ; 

But sweat from their foreheads 

Was dripping like rain, 

. And none of the toilers 

Gave heed to his strain. 
6* 



130 THE RAGGED BARD OF RAMRIN. 

XIV. 
He joined a carousal 

Of sailors ashore, 
Who listened a moment, 

But listened no more, 
And, filling their bumpers, 

Caroused as before. 

XV. 
He entered where dancers 

A festival kept, — 
Who called him a novice, 

And not an adept,. 
For playing a measure 

They never had stept. 

XVI. 
He offered his anthem 

At wedding and bier, 
To sweeten and brighten 

The smile and the tear, 
But laughers and weepers 

Cared little to hear. 



THE RAGGED BARD OF RAMBIN. 131 

XVII. 
At eve, he returned 

To the elfin's retreat, 
And told how he wandered 

With blistering feet, 
Nor earned since the morning 

A mouthful to eat. 

XVIII. 
The elf, in the moonlight, 

With wink of his eye, 
Then said to the singer 

(Who heard with a sigh) : 
"The days of the poets 

Are over and by. 

XIX. 
" Now, therefore, with poverty 

Pinching thee sharp, 
With people to cavil 

And people to carp, 
O beggarly harper, 

Return me thy harp ! " 



132 THE RAGGED BARD OF RAMBIN, 

XX. 
" Nay, not for a kingdom ! " 

The poet replied, 
" And prithee, good elfin, 

Return me my bride, 
Who flitted at morning 

And fled from my side. 

XXI. 

" And swear by thy beard 

Of a century's growth, 
To link us in wedlock, 

And father us both, — 
And call the six planets 

To witness thy oath." 

XXII. 
" I swear," quoth the elfin, 

"That thine is she now, 
Henceforth, and forever!" 

And, lifting his brow, 
He called the six planets 

To witness his vow. 



THE RAGGED BARD OF RAMBIN. 1 33 

XXIII. 
She brought to the bridegroom 

No dowry of gold, 
Nor lands and possessions 

To have and to hold, 
Nor woman's warm body 

To clasp and enfold. 

XXIV. 

She brought to him only 

The gifts which a sprite 
May bring to a poet 

To be his delight,— 
A dowry of fancies 

By day and by night. 

XXV. 

" Go sing," said the elfin, 

" Again through the land, — 
Thy bride at thy side, 

And thy harp in thy hand ; 
The foolish shall listen — 

The wise understand. 



134 THE RAGGED BARD OF RAMBIN. 

XXVI. 
" Go forth, but return 

In a year and a day 
To tell how thou farest 

For singing thy lay, 
And what are the plaudits, 

And what is the pay." 

XXVII. 
Then near him, and with him, 

Invisibly went 
The sprite, the fair phantom, 

The bride who was sent 
To breathe on his spirit 

The spell of content. 

XXVIII. ' 
Folk smiled at the rags 

Of the bard's gaberdine, 
Nor dreamed that beside him, 

Albeit unseen, 
He had a companion 

As fair as a queen. 



THE RAGGED BARD OF RAMBIN, 1 35 

XXIX. 
For though the king's daughters 

Should gallop that way, 
All gowned in their satins 

And royal array, 
The bard had a bride 

Who was brighter than they. 

xxx. 
His fair one was fickle, 

She went and she came, 
Her beauty was changeful 

And never the same, 
Yet always she kindled 

His soul to a flame. 

XXXI. 

He sang to the lofty — 

He sang to the low ; 
But whether the multitude 

Heeded or no, 
The soul of the singer 

Was always aglow. 



3 6 THE RAGGED BARD OF RAMBIN. 

XXXII. 
So traveled the troubadour 

All the year round ; 
And when the next daffodils 

Spangled the ground, 
He sought for the goblin — 

Who could not be found. 

XXXIII. 
The elves, with their antics 

And innocent mirth, 
Had all by King Olaf — 

With all they were worth 
In trinkets and treasures, — 

Been banished from earth. 

XXXIV. 
The bride of the minstrel, 

The last of her clan, 
Avoided the sentence, 

Evading the ban 
By hiding away 

In the heart of a man. 



THE RAGGED BARD OF RAMBIN. 1 37 

XXXV. 
Deep hid in his bosom, 

She whispered and said : 
" Write thou into Elfland 

A rune to be read 
To tell how thou lovest 

The wife thou hast wed." 

XXXVI. 
These verses the poet 

Then pinned to a tree : 
" O king of the elfins, 

Wherever thou be, 
I, poet and beggar, 

Send greeting to thee : 

XXXVII. 
" Three treasures I begged for, 

O bountiful elf, — 

A wreath of green laurel, 
A purse full of pelf, 

A bride who in beauty- 
Was beauty itself. 



138 THE RAGGED BARD OF RAMBIN. 

XXXVIII. 
" I harped at thy bidding, 

Through country and town, 
From springtime till summer, — 

Till autumn was brown, — 
And till from the Northland 

,The winter came down. 

xxxix. 
" 111 fareth, O master, 

Thy dutiful thrall ; 
My wallet is empty — 

My glory is small — 
My bride is my treasure, 

My all and in all. 

XL. 
" She cometh at midnight, 

My vision, my dream, 
My ever sweet fancy, 

So fair that I deem 
All else to be nothing, 

For she is supreme. 



THE RAGGED BARD OF RAMBIN. 1 39 

XLI. 
" But save for my fancy, 

With wings in the air, 
Uplifting my spirit, — 

elfin, I swear 
That else would my poverty 

Be my despair. 

XLII. 

" My bread, it is bitter — 

By charity doled ; 
My mantle is tattered ; 

My sandals are old ; 
My couch is the meadow ; 

My pillow, the mould ! 

XLIII. 
" The lot of the minstrel, 

master, is hard ; 
The lyre is a thing 

Of forgotten regard ; 
The world is no longer 

A place for a bard. 



140 THE RAGGED BARD OF RAMBIN. 

XLIV. 

" A world that is sordid, 
That dickers and delves, 

That banishes fairies, 

That banishes elves, 
Will by and by banish 
The poets themselves ! " 

XLV. 

Here ended the writing ; 

It hung on a yew ; 
It hung till it mouldered 

And rotted with dew ; 
Then, many years after, 

It proved to be true. 



THE BOAST OF EBERHART. 



THE BOAST OF EBERHART. 

JULY 21, A.D. I495. 



I. 

A SWABIAN statue, white as snow 
(Though time will stain it soon), 
Adorns a park where lindens grow, 
And tells a tale of long ago, 
In marble newly hewn. 

II. 

Once, at a Kaiser's banquet grand, 

A knight of low degree, 

Count Eberhart of Schwabenland, 

Sat down with Dukes on either hand 

More rich and proud than he. 

143 



144 THE BOAST OF EBERHART. 

III. 

The feast was on a windy green, 

And under rustling trees, 
And Kaiser Max's gaberdine 
And Eberhart's white beard were seen, 

Both fluttering in the breeze. 

IV. 

So great a crowd was never known, 

And reached from vale to hill, 
Yet from the Kaiser on the throne, 
Down to the dog that craved a bone, 
All feasted to their fill. 



" Count," said the Kaiser, as they dined, 
" Thy Swabian realm is small, 

Yet nobleness so marks thy mind 

That in thy noble self I find . 
My noblest knight of all. 



THE BOAST OF EBERHART. 145 

VI. 

" I hang this ribbon round thy neck, 

And thee I thus ordain 
The Duke of Wiirtemberg and Teck, 
^ For thine escutcheon hath no speck, 

Thine honor hath no stain." 

VII. 

The envious nobles gnashed their teeth 

That one whose land was bare 
Had gathered from a barren heath 
A far more glorious laurel wreath 

Than they could win and wear. 

VIII. 

The Kaiser, from the chair of state 

Wherein he sat as host, 

Then bade each titled guest relate 

In what his fief was rich or great, 

Whereof its lord might boast. 
7 



146 THE BOAST OF EBERHART, 

IX. 
Outspake the huge Count Palatine, 

A burly, tipsy peer : 
" I rule the country of the Rhine, 
And I may boast of Rhenish wine,- 

For see, we drink it here." 



Quoth Albrecht, miserly and old :, 

" In Saxony's high hills 
The iron which I smelt and mould 
Outranks the preciousness of gold; 

I boast of mines and mills." 

XI. 

Quoth Ludwig, " when Bavaria's foes 

Besiege me with their powers, — 
My walls and bastions, guns and bows 
Shall answer blows with deadlier blows 
I boast of towns and towers." 



THE BOAST OF EBERHART. 147 

XII. 

Then last spake good old Eberhart, 

And put them all to shame, — 
Yet not with boast of town or mart, 
Or mine or mill, or archer's dart, 

Or soldier's field of fame. 

XIII. 

" Ye rule," said he, "with hand too strong, 

And fear your people's frown, 
And tremble as ye ride along 
Lest hands be lifted by the throng 

To strike their tyrants down. 

XIV. 

" But me, without my armed band, 

Without my plume or helm, 
My happy people, cap in hand, 
Salute as father of the land, 

And founder of the realm. 



148 THE BOAST OF EBERHART. 

XV. 
" Wherever shepherd feeds his sheep, 

Or hunter baits his trap, 
In lonely glen, or forest deep, 
I lay my head, and dare to sleep 
In any peasant's lap." 

XVI. 

Uprose from the astonished crowd 

Who heard the bearded Duke 
A sudden cheer, so ringing loud 
That every tyrant lord was cowed, 
And quailed at the rebuke. 

XVII. 
Before the whole assembled court 

The Kaiser waved his hand 
And bade the frolic winds, for sport, 
Go whisper Eberhart's retort 

Through all the laughing land. 



THE BOAST OF EBERHART. 149 

XVIII. 

Whoever hurries to and fro 

In Stuttgart stops to see 
The Great Duke, sculptured, lying low 
And fast asleep, as long ago 

Upon a peasant's knee. 



THE PHANTOM OX. 



THE PHANTOM OX. 



[Among the Swabian peasants it is a superstition that a spectre, 
in the form of a white ox, glides through villages and farms, and 
that any person on whom he breathes will at once sicken and die.] 



I. 

" What frightens you in from your play, my child ? 
"Your cheeks are as white as snow, 
Your lips are pale, and your eyes are wild ; 
Oh, why do you tremble so ? " 

II. 

" Dear mother, while I was wading the brook 

For lilies along the brink, 

A ghostly ox, with a deathly look, 

Came down to the stream to drink. 

7* 153 



154 THE PHANTOM OX. 

III. 
" The creature was not of flesh and bones. 

But paler than crystal glass ; 
I saw through his body the trees and stones 

And mosses and meadow grass. 



IV. 

" He wandered round, and wherever he went 
He stepped with so light a tread 

No harebell under his hoof was bent, 
No violet bowed its head. 



V. 

" He cast no shadow upon the ground, 
No image upon the stream ; 

His lowing was fainter than any sound 
That ever was heard in a dream. 



THE PHANTOM OX. 1 55 

VI. 

" I quivered and quaked in every limb ! 

I knew not whither to flee ; 
The further away I shrank from him, 

The nearer he came to me. 



VII. 
" My handful of lilies he sniffed and smelt ; 

His breath was chilly and fresh ; 
His horns, as they touched me softly, felt 

Like icicles to my flesh. 



VIII. 

'• I shivered with cold, I burned with flame, 

I called upon God and man : 
But nobody heard, and nobody came, — 

And then I started and ran. 



156 THE PHANTOM OX. 

IX. 
" I rushed through the water across the brook, 

And high on the shelving shore 
I stopped and ventured to turn and look, 

In hope to see him no more. 



x. 

" He walked in my wake on the top of the flood, 

And followed me up the bank ! 
A blast from his nostrils froze my blood ! 

My spirit within me sank ! 



XI. 

" I hid in the reeds, O mother dear, 

But swift as a whiff of air 
He followed me there ! — he followed me here !- 

He follows me everywhere ! 



THE PHANTOM OX. I 57 

XII. 
"Ofi, frown at him, frighten him, drive him away! 

He's coming in at the door! " 
And down fell the lad in a swoon, and lay 

At his mother's feet on the floor. 



XIII. 

The mother looked round her dazed and dumb 

She saw but the empty air, 
Yet knew if the phantom ox had come, 

The shadow of death was there ! 



XIV. 

She caught the pallid boy to her breast, 

And pillowed him on his bed ; 
.The white-eyed moon kept watch in the west ; 

The beautiful child lay dead ! 



CHARLEMAGNE AND HILDEGARD. 



CHARLEMAGNE AND HILDEGARD. 

A.D. 770. 



I. 

Fair Hildegard, the Swabian maid, 

The fairest ever seen, 
Was pure in heart, gave alms and prayed, 

And then was chosen queen. 



II. 

The Kaiser of the Iron Crown 
Became her wedded lord, 

Yet other suitors of renown 
Her beauty still adored. 



161 



1 62 CHARLEMAGNE AND HILDEGARD. 

III. 

" I love you well," base Taland said, 

A noble of her train, 
Who sought to lure her to his bed, 

But tempted her in vain. 



IV. 

Then with a woman's ruthless wrath 
She smote him with a mace, 

And bade him never cross her path, 
Or show to her his face ! 



The crafty Taland, stung with shame, 

Accused her to the king, 
Who. prone to credit woman's blame, 

Snatched off her bridal ring. 



CHARLEMAGNE AND HILDEGARD. 163 

VI. 

He swore that were she thrice a queen, 
The crown was hers no more, — 

And spurned her as a thing unclean, 
And drove her from his door. 



VII. 

Forth from her palace and her crown, — 

The purest of the pure, — 
She went a beggar through the town, 

And dwelt among the poor. 



VIII. 

The grace of heaven upon her fell, 

Till at her pious touch 
The deaf could hear, the sick grew well, 

The lame flucg down the crutch. 



1 64 CHARLEMAGNE AND HILDEGARD. 

IX. 

Base Taland, who was racked in mind, 
And filled with devils seven, 

Was smit of fever, and grew blind, — ■ 
Scourged by the wrath of heaven ! 



He sat beside the king's highway, 
And begged his daily bread ; 

And Hildegard laid moistened clay 
Upon his eyes, and said, — 



XI. 

" O perjured creature, dost thou know 

Who is it blesses thee ? 
I was too cruel — rise and go — 

Be no more blind, but see." 



CHARLEMAGNE AND HILDEGARD. 1 65 

XII. 

His tortured heart within him stirred, 

And his remorse was keen, — 
For ere the blind man saw, he heard, 

And knew it was the queen. 



XIII. 

And when he saw her, he was cowed, 
And flung him to the ground, 

And kissed her garment's hem, and vowed 
She should again be crowned. 



XIV. 

He hurried to the Kaiser's throne, 
And bent his trembling knee, 

And wept, and made his treason known, 
And cried " O woe is me ! " 



166 CHARLEMAGNE AND HILDEGARD. 

XV. 

The wrathful monarch scarce could list 
Until the words were said, 

But smote him with a giant's fist 
And laid the traitor dead. 



XVI. 

The Kaiser, with such royal state 
As never had been seen, 

Awaited at the palace-gate 
The coming of the queen. 



XVII. 

The stony street beneath her tread 
Sprang into flowers full blown, 

And with a halo round her head 
The queen went to her throne. 



THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCH 
HEIM. 



THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCHHEIM. 

A.D. I456. 



Part First. 
I. 

" My liege, before your head was gray, 

You rode to Palestine, 
A belted knight, to kneel and pray 

At Christ the Lord's own shrine. 



II. 

" Now you who served our holy Lord 

Upon a foreign shore, 

Must draw for Him your valiant sword 

Here at your very door. 

8 169 



170 THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCHHEIM. 

III. 
" For here a worse than Moor or Turk, 

Yet bearer of your name, 
Now works the Devil's evil work, 

And puts the Lord to shame." 



IV. 
So spake to old Duke Eberhart 

Old Barbara, his spouse, 
And saw the sudden lightnings dart 

Beneath his shaggy brows. 



V. 
He stroked his white and mighty beard, 

And strode across his hall, 
And said, " the God whom I have feared 

Is God the Lord of all. 



THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCHHEIM. 17 1 

VI. 

"All foes to Him are foes to me, 

And to my ducal crown, 
And who or what or where they be, 

This arm shall strike them down. 



VII. 

" I hoped that I no more should fight, 

For now my head is hoar, 
But is there yet a wrong to right, 

Here at my very door ? 



VIII. 

" Who is the doer of the deed ? 

He shall be scourged and banned ! 
What evil tidings do you read — 

What scroll is in your hand ? " 



172 THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCHHEIM. 

IX. 

" My liege," she said, " a Kirchheim nun, 

An abbess whom I know, 
Sends message that your foster-son 

Is now your rebel foe. 



X. 

" Blasphemer of the Holy Rood, 
He once in Kirchheim Manse 

Held revel with an abbess lewd, 
And led the nuns in dance. 



XI. 

" Once more a traitor to his liege, 
He leads his bandits bold, 

And holds the convent now in siege, 
To rob it of its gold. 



THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCHHEIM. 1 73 

XII. 

" The brave new abbess guards the lock 

And keeps the thieves away, 
But she and her beleaguered flock 

Eat their last loaf to-day. 



XIII. 

" The winter wind is cold and keen, 
And they have burnt for fire 

Their garden-fence and altar-screen 
And carvings of the choir. 



XIV. 
" Half starved, half frozen, sore afraid, 

They now appeal to me, 
But who am I to give them aid ? 

The aid must come from thee." 



1/4 THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCHHEIM. 



Part Second. 
XV. 

Young Eberhart felt not the cold ; 

His bivouac fire was bright ; 
Quoth he, " Fill high, my comrades bold : 

Let us carouse to-night ! 



XVI. 

" It were too rash to point our guns 
And aim our bended bows 

Against a sisterhood of nuns, — 
No Amazonian foes. 



THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCHHEIM. 1 75 

XVII. 
" But trost or famine, soon or late, 

I care not which it be, 
Must open wide to us the gate, 

Or send to us the key. 



XVIII. 

" The Manse was merrier, years ago, 
The night we made our raid, 

For many a nun next morn, we know, 
Awoke no more a maid. 



XIX. 
" Now may they feel the Devil's curse, 

For now they sing and pray, 
And when we come to raise a purse, 

They bid us ride away. 



17^ THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCHHEIM. 

XX. 
" Let cold and hunger make them smart,- 

And then, my merry men, 
When they have paid us to depart, 

Why, we will come again." 



THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCHHEIM. 1 77 



Part Third, 

XXI. 
At dead of night the sisterhood 

Were wakened by a cry ; 
It came from out a birchen wood, 

That clad the hill thereby. 



XXII. 



Then battle-shoutings filled the air, 

And clarions made a clang, 
And trumpets sounded with a blare, 



And all the forest rang. 

8* 



173 THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCHHEIM. 

XXIII. 

" O Christ ! " exclaimed the Sisters pale, 
Who stood aghast with fright, 

" Shall bolts and bars no more avail, 
And must we die to-night ? 



XXIV. 

" O hark ! The wild and savage horde 
Are battering down the gate, 

And they will put us to the sword, 
Or to a fouler fate ! " 



XXV. 

" My daughters," cried the Abbess gray, 

Undaunted by a fear, 
" Flee to the altar, — kneel and pray, — 

And God in heaven will hear. 



THE BESIEGED NUNS OE KIRCH HELM. 1 79 

XXVI. 

" He who sustains us by his grace 
Through hunger and through cold 

Will scourge from out his holy place 
The thieves as once of old." 



XXVII. 

They prayed like those who think their prayer 

Is breathed with dying breath, 
Who pray to conquer their despair, — 

To triumph over death. 



XXVIII. 

The strength for which they prayed, they felt 
(For prayer hath wondrous might), 

And round about them as they knelt, 
There dawned a gentle light. 



180 THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCHHEIM. 

XXIX. 
It was the softest, purest ray 

That heaven can send to earth, — 
The dawning of a new-born day, 

And blessed was its birth. 



XXX. 

It shone upon a thousand spears, 
Which in the shadowy night 

Had pricked the bandit Halberdiers, 
And put them all to flight. 



XXXI. 

The leaves that scatter when the blast 

Upon the forest blows 
Fly not so wildly nor so fast 

As fled the robber foes. 



THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCHHEIM. l8l 

XXXII. 

At first the frightened nuns within, 

Who, at the flush of dawn, 
Crouched trembling at the clash and din, 

Knew not the knaves were gone. 

XXXIII. 

So when the rescuers came and knocked, 

And not a voice replied, 
And the grim gate stood barred and locked, 

They burst it open wide. 



XXXIV. 

Then rose a shriek that pierced the air- 
For still the nuns, dismayed, 

Believed their ravishers were there, 
With spear and battle-blade. 



1 82 THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCHHELM. 

XXXV. 

The Sisters saw a gentler sight, 

Yet trembled as before, 
And some through faintness and delight 

Sank weeping to the floor. 



xxxvi. 

The victors brought a laden wain, 
Piled high with bread and wine, 

And rolled it forward through the fane 
Before St. Mary's shrine. 



XXXVII. 

No priest was there, no mass was said, 

Yet steel-clad, warlike men 
Poured out the wine and brake the bread, 

And poured and brake again. 



THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCHHEIM. 1 83 
XXXVIII. 

Foremost in all the happy scene, 

A man with snowy beard 
And shaggy brows and eyes serene 

And dinted sword appeared. 



xxxix. 

It was old Eberhart the brave, 

The same who in his youth 
Had vowed upon the Lord's own grave 

To serve the Lord's own truth. 



XL. 

And in his age, as in his prime, 

It still was his delight 
To help the weak and punish crime 

And battle for the right. 



1 84 THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCHHE1M. 



Part Fourth. 



XLI. 



The Duke departed with his train, 
And sent the Duchess there 

(To whom the Abbess not in vain 
Had writ in her despair). 

XLII. 

The Abbess kissed old Barbara's hand ; 

The nuns, her garment's hem ; 
And she, the Duchess of the land, 

Besought a boon from them. 



THE BESIEGED NUNS OF K1RCHHEIM. 1 85 

XLIII. 

The boon she sought for was a cell, 

Wherein awhile to stay, 
To learn to bid the world farewell, 

And wait her dying day. 



XLIV. 

Not long she waited : {who indeed 

Hath ever long to wait 
While fleeting time, with flying speed, 

So fast fulfilleth fate ?) 



XLV. 
The Duchess saw the Duke inurned, 

And straightway from his tomb, 
Not to her ducal court returned, 

But to her cloistered room. 



1 86 THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCHHE1M. 

XLVI. 
In happy slumber, like a trance, 

She closed her tranquil eyes, 
And she will sleep in Kirchheim Manse 

Until the dead shall rise. 



BALLAD OF A BABY. 



BALLAD OF A BABY. 



A.D. I307. 



It was all a hurry-scurry, 

Duke and duchess in a flurry, 

For at last, with hope forlorn, 

They had fled — O tale ot pity ! — 

From their sacked and burning city, 

With their little babe new-born. 

189 



190 BALLAD OF A BABY. 

II. 

When Duke Friedrich, sore defeated, 

With his flying troops retreated 

Through the Neckar's winding vale, 
And the foe pursued for slaughter, — 
Up from Friedrich's baby daughter 
Rose a faint and moaning wail. 

III. 

" Now what ails the little being? " 

Quoth the sire, as they were fleeing, — 

Fleeing wildly, hotly pressed ; 
And the mother answered, sighing 
" Ah, the little thing is crying, 

For she needs her mother's breast." 

IV. 
Down the duke from saddle vaulted, 

Shouting, " Let the troops be halted — 

Let the furies do their worst — 

Let the country-folk betray us — 

Let the conquerors find and slay us — 

But the baby shall be nursed ! " 



BALLAD OF A BABY. 191 

V. 

So. within a shady hollow, 

Though the foe was soon to follow, 

And to tarry was to die, 
Horse and rider stopped to water, 
While the little ducal daughter 

Drank her milky fountain dry. 

VI. 

The pursuers would have chuckled 

Had they seen the baby suckled, 

But they rode another way, 
And they never set their clutches 
On the happy duke and duchess, 

For the baby saved the day! 

VII. 

Then the fugitives, though routed, 

Being saved from slaughter, shouted, — 
And they vowed amid their joy 

That the babe, for that day's merit, 

Should the ducal crown inherit 
Just as if she were a boy. 



192 BALLAD OF A BABY. 

VIII. 
When at last the child so tender, 

Who had been the land's defender, 
Was a peerless woman grown, — 

Not a flounced and sighing charmer, 

But an Amazon in armor, 

She was duchess on the throne. 



THE KING'S WAGER. 
9 



THE KING'S WAGER, 



I. 
The king was tired of fighting, 

And wished his wars to cease. 
And said to all his nobles, 

" I go to make a peace. 



II. 

" The duke, our haughty neighbor- 

Against whom we contend, 
Must yield to us his daughter, 

And call us son and friend. 

i95 



196 THE KING'S WAGER. 

III. 
".Then shall the father's dukedom 

Go with the daughter's hand, 
And peace shall knit our borders, 

And joy shall fill our land. 



IV. 

" But since, to our petition, 
The duke her hand denies, 

I go to seek the maiden, 
And woo her in disguise. 



V. 
" They say she mopes and muses, 

And sighs and dwells apart, 
And turns away her lovers, 

And keeps a virgin heart. 



THE KINGS WAGER. 1 97 

VI. 
" What in a maiden's bosom 

Should make her muse and mope? 
Not love, and yet a longing, — 

Not love, and yet a hope. 



VII. 

" Why should the duke's fair daughter 

Sit silently and sigh, 
Save that her one true lover 

Hath never ridden by ? 



VIII. 
" Who is her one true lover? 

What prince of high degree ? 
A faith is born within me 

That I alone am he. 



198 THE KING'S WAGER. 

IX. 

" A thousand crowns I wager 
That she is wooed and won, 

And joins to-night our wassail 
Before the feast is done ! 



x. 

" Prepare ye then the banquet ! 

Bring costly cates and wine ! 
The dukedom and the daughter 
To-night shall both be mine ! 



XI. 

" Lead forth my saddled stallion, 
For I this morn must ride 

Full forty miles ere noon-day, 
To woo and win a bride." 



THE KING'S WAGER. 199 



, XII. 

They brought his red roan courser, 

A noble Stuttgart steed, 
That snorted to his rider, 

Who spurred him to his speed. 



XIII. 

Through highway and through by-way, 

From hilltop unto plain, 
The courser bore a rider 

Who never checked the rein. 



XIV. 
Quoth man and maid who saw them, 

" Who is it rides so fast ? " 
Yet little knew the gazers 

It was the king who passed. 



200 THE KINGS WAGER. 

XV. * 

He wore a minstrel's mantle, 
He bore a minstrel's lyre, 

And in his eye of azure 

There gleamed a minstrel's fire. 



XVI. 

High stood the sun in heaven ; 

It was the noon of day ; 
Before the duke's strong castle 

The shortened shadows lay. 



XVII. 
The minstrel at the postern 

Knocked loud and waited long 
Until the duke's fair daughter 

Would listen to his song. 



THE KINGS WAGER, 201 

XVIII. 
At last, at his beseeching, 

She let the wanderer in ; 
But then she blushed with anger, 

To hear him thus begin : 



XIX. 

" O fairest of fair maidens, 
Men say thy heart is hard ; 

Thou scornest lofty wooers, 
Yet hear a humble bard. 



XX. 

" My heart is broken, bleeding, 
And all for love of thee ! 

In day-dreams and in night-dreams 
Thou comest unto me. 



202 THE KING'S WAGER. 

XXI. 

" Thou comest not an angel 
From chill and distant skies, 

But as a mortal maiden, 
With passion in thine eyes. 



XXII. 
" The midnight and the morning, 

The evening and the noon, 
Are lighted by thy beauty, 

Not by the sun and moon. 



XXIII. 
" Love burneth in thy bosom, 

A quenchless vestal fire, 
And I am come, thy lover, 

And lord of thy desire. 



THE KING'S WAGER. 20$ 

XXIV. 
" Chide not the poet's frenzy, 

Think not the minstrel crazed, 
For on thy love-lit beauty 

I in my dreams have gazed. 



xxv. 

" And by this sign and token, 
I know that thou of me 

Hast had thy dream and vision, 
And our two fates agree. 



XXVI. 

' Why standest thou in wonder ? 

Why dost thou tremble so ? 
Think'st thou of rank and station ? 



Think'st thou of high and low ? 



204 THE KING'S WAGER. 

XXVII 

" What though thy blood be noble, 

And I be lowly born, 
Shall then a minstrel's passion 

Yield to a lady's scorn ? 



XXVIII. 

" Thou dwellest in thy castle, 
I wander on the moor ; 

But love, like God who made it, 
Knows neither rich nor poor. 



XXIX. 

" Although the king should woo thee, 
And ask thee to his throne, 

The wooer who shall win thee 
Is I, and I alone. 



THE KINGS WAGER. 205 

XXX. 
" Stamp not thy foot in anger ! 

Turn not thy head aside ! 
Wert thou the queen of Sheba 

Still thou shouldst be my bride ! " 

XXXI. 

She mocked with merry laughter ; 

She knit her brows and frowned ; 
She blushed, and sighed, and pondered, 

And gazed upon the ground. 



XXXII. 

" Go hence, thou idle singer, 
Come hither nevermore ; . 

Thy song awakes my sorrow, 
My heart is wounded sore. 



206 THE KING'S WAGER. 

XXXIII. 

" What though I dream at midnight, 
My dream is not of thee, 

My state is high and princely, 
And so my lord must be. 



xxxiv. 

" Thou art a wandering minstrel, 
And though thy song be sweet, 

How could I love a lover 

Whose, love were so unmeet ? " 



xxxv 

His lips grew white with passion, 
His eyes grew black with fire ; 

Down on the marble pavement 
He dashed his quivering lyre ! 



THE KINGS WAGER. 207 

XXXVI. 

The fragile thing was broken ; 

The strings were snapped in twain ; 
And then the fiery minstrel 

Wooed in a fiercer strain. 



XXXVII. 

" O thou elect and chosen, 
Whom I have long adored, 

Fly hence with thy true lover, 
Fly now with thy true lord ! " 



XXXVIII. 

He clasped her to his bosom; 

She trembled, half afraid ; 
For never low-born wooer 



So wooed a high-born maid. 



208 THE KING'S WAGER. 

XXXIX. 

She knew not what to answer, 
And tried to answer nay, 

But ere her Hps could say it, 
He kissed the word away. 



XL. 

He kissed her, and he kissed her, 

And ever as he kissed, 
There gathered on her eyelids 

A dim and blinding mist. 



XLI. 

The minstrel was a tempest, — 

The maid a lily-flower 
Whose haughty head was humbled 

Beneath the wild wind's power. 



THE KINGS WAGER. 20g 

XLII. 

She bent her head, she yielded 

The lily of her hand, 
She mounted with the minstrel 

To seek his own far land. 



XLIII. 

One steed bore both the riders, 
And furious was his pace ; 

One cloak wrapped both the lovers, 
Who rode in close embrace. 



XLIV. 

Then thrice a league they traveled, 
And thrice a league yet more ; 

The sun went down behind them, 
The moon rose up before. 



210 THE KINGS WAGER. 

XLV. 

The stars, with timid twinkle, 
Came struggling into sight ; 

And on the red roan courser 
The foam was snowy white. 

XLVI. 

Through byway and through highway, 

From valley unto hill, 
The horse failed not the riders, 

But onward galloped still. 

XLVII. 

Quoth man and maid who saw them, 
" Who is it rides so fast ? " 

Yet little knew the gazers 
It was the king who passed. 



THE KINGS WA GER. 2 1 1 



XLVIII. 



And little knew the lady, 

Nor even dreamed or guessed, 

How royal was the lover 
Who held her to his breast. 



XLIX. 

Quoth she, u The ride is weary, 
The night is waxing late ! " 

Quoth he, " The ride is ended- 
Here halt we at our gate." 



It was a frowning portal, 
As huge and grim and old 

As if a hundred monarchs 

Had made it their stronghold. 



2 1 2 THE KING'S WA GER, 

LI. 
"And is it to a dungeon 

That' thou thy bride dost bring ? ,! 
" Not so," quoth he, "we enter 

The palace of the king. 



LII. 

" For here the king is keeping 
His wedding-feast to-night, 

And many a flute is playing, 
And many a lamp is bright. 



LIU. 

" Yet what avail the music, 

The dance, and all beside? 
The weddine-feast still lacketh 



The bridegroom and the bride. 



THE KING'S WAGER. 213 

LIV. 

The palace-gate swung open 

At word of his command, — 
No more a wandering minstrel, 

But monarch of the land. 



LV. 

From hall to hall resounded 

A merry mad uproar, 
" The king, the king ! " they shouted, 

"The king is at the door! 



LVI. 

" The king hath won his wager! 

The king hath brought his bride ! " 
And half a hundred nobles 

Pressed to the lady's side. 



2 1 4 THE KING'S WA GER, 

LVII. 

Then down they knelt before her, 
And kissed the soft white hand 

That brought the boon and blessing 
Of peace to all the land. 



THE DOUBLE STRATAGEM. 



THE DOUBLE STRATAGEM. 

[GRAF GAFFIR OF SWABIA TELLS HOW HE COURTED HIS ITALIAN- 
WIFE.] 



I. 

" Pauline shall fill your glasses, 
And, as you sip your wine, 

I will relate a lover's tale 
Of how I made her mine. 



II. 

" I knew that she was haughty, 

Like all her Tuscan race, — • 

And every wooer grew abashed 

Who looked her in the face. 
10 217 



2 1 8 THE D O UBLE STRA TA GEM. 

III. 

" So, pleading not my passion, 
Lest she should flout the flame, 

I sent my love a lover's gift, 
But signed a stranger's name. 



IV. 

" It was a blood-red ruby, — 
So full of love's own fire 

That well I knew the woman's wit 
Would guess the man's desire. 



V. 

" If she received my token, 

Her breast would burn to know 

Who was the giver of the gift, — 
What lover loved her so. 



THE DOUBLE STRATAGEM. 2ig 

VI. 

u We met. Quoth she, ' A stranger — 
Whose name is — (let me see — 

I think he writes it Valentine) — 
Hath sent a gift to me.' 



VII. 
" Quoth I, ' He is my comrade- 

A sad and love-sick bard ! 
He loves thee well, lady fair, 

Alas, his fate is hard ! ' 



VIII. 
" ' Thy comrade? send him hither! 

But come not as his guide, — 
For I a message have for him — 

For him, and none beside ! ' 



220 THE D O UBLE STRA TA GEM. 

IX. 

" ' Nay, write thy message, lady — ' 
Sit here and write it down, — 

And I will bear it as thy page, 
And seek him through the town.' 



x. 

" 4 What ? write my bosom's secret 
And trust the scroll to thee? 

Go, trifler, get thee hence with speed, 
And send thy friend to me ! ' 



XI. 
" I left her — and I curst her — 

Herself, and all her tribe — 
Yet I returned to her, disguised 

As Valentine, a scribe ! 



THE D O UBLE STRA TA GEM. 22 1 

XII. 

" Quoth she, ' Take back thy jewel — 

My heart is not my own — 
My heart is his who sent thee here — 

O why is his a stone ? ' 



XIII. 
" I dropped my cloak and visor — 

I clasped her to my breast — 
I kissed her madly, mouth to mouth- 

I need not tell the rest. 



XIV. 
" See how Pauline is blushing ! — 

She blushes like the wine ; 
What if she had said no to me, 

And yes to Valentine ? " 



FRITZ OTTOCAR'S FELLOW- 
HUNTSMAN. 



FRITZ OTTOCAR'S FELLOW-HUNTSMAN. 



I WONDER what keeps my comrade ? 

The daybreak is all aglow ! 
Once more I will blow my bugle — 

Oho ! tally-ho ! oho ! 



II. 

My comrade was never a laggard, — 

For, deep in the forest dim, 

How many a stag I have started 

At peep o' the light with him ! 
10* 225 



226 FRITZ OTTOCARS FELLOW-HUNTSMAN. 

III. 

He wingeth the truest arrow 

That ever a mountaineer 
Sent out of a cross-bow, whizzing 

With death to a dappled deer. 



IV. 
Why pipeth he back no answer? 

He maketh no sound nor sign ! 
I hear tally-ho in the distance, 

But that is the echo of mine. 



V. 

Full many a morning, my comrade 
Has answered my bugle-call, 

Yet now he is mute, and misses 
The goodliest day of all. 



FRITZ OTTO CAR'S FELLOW-HUNTSMAN. 227 

VI. 

The frost, that has whitened the heather, 

Will huddle the herd to drink 
From holes in the ice this morning — 

A chance for a shot, I think. 



VII. 

So crispy a crust for stalking 
Comes not in a year and a day; 

What spell has bewitched my comrade 
To fool such a chance away ? 



VIII. 

By Juno ! I now bethink me 
He yesterday wedded a bride ! 

She tangleth him in her tresses — 
She bindeth him to her side ! 



228 FRITZ OTTOCAR'S FELLOW-HUNTSMAN. 

IX. 

My comrade was always a rover, 
- As wild as a hawk on the wing, 
Yet now he is caged with a ringdove, — 
Or tied to an apron-string. 



x. 

A woman can fasten a fetter 
Too strong for a man to rend — 

My comrade is now a captive, 
In bondage that never can end. 



XI. 

A man is a fool to marry — 
He never can come nor go ! 

But hark ! he is blowing his bugle ! 
Oho ! tally-ho ! oho ! 



EBERHART IM BART. 



EBERHART IM BART. 

A.D. I445-I496. 



In Uracil's ancient ducal hall 

There hangs a portrait on the wall, 

Of Swabia's duke, the loved — the feared- 

The hero of the flowing beard — 

The beard renowned in Swabian song 

As having been a half-mile long — 

Great Eberhart Im Bart, 

Pride of the Swabian heart. 

231 



232 EBERHAR7 IM BART. 

II. 

He was the duke whose pious spouse, 
Big Barbara of his faithful vows, 
By heaven and earth was marvelled at 
For growing so in grace and fat, 
That when she went to church to pray 
It took some twenty men, they say, 

Or twelve, or thereabout, 

To lift her in and out. 



III. 

He was the duke who killed the boar 
Which other hunters feared before, 
Till in a wild and lonely place, 
Unarmed, he met him face to face, 
And smote him as with Samson's fist, 
Or wrenched his jaw with such a twist 

That he the monster slew 

(If either tale be true). 



EBERHART IM BART, 233 

IV. 

He was the duke who gave renown 
To Tubingen's time-honored town, 
Wherein he fixed the classic seat 
Where Swabia's students daily meet, 
And where, in meeting, ere they part, 
In memory still of Eberhart, 

Each day of all the year, 

They swig their Swabian beer. 

V. 

He was the duke who, when denied 
Chief place at council-board, replied, 
" My lords, this petty, poor debate 
Postpones the business of the state ; 
If you will do some useful thing 
To serve the country and the king, 

/ am content, by Jove, 

To sit behind the stove ! " 



234 EBERHART IM BART. 

VI. 

He was the duke who made the boast 
That he, without his armed host, 
Without his sword, without his helm, 
Could ride alone through all his realm ; 
And, if he chanced to lack a bed, 
Could safely couch his weary head 

And sweetly take his nap 

On any peasant's lap. 



VII. 

He was the duke who laid his sword 
Upon the tomb of Christ the Lord, 
And vowed a vow as Christian knight 
To battle for the truth and right, 
To help the weak against the strong, 
To rid his realm of all its wrong, 
And who, in letters fair, 
Wrote on his shield, * I DARE.* 



EBERHART IM BART. 235 

VIII. 

He was the duke whose narrow land 
So broadened underneath his hand 
That as his coronet passed down 
It grew and brightened to a crown ; — 
Nor has there reigned in Swabia since 
A king so royal as the prince 

Who, with so small a state, 

Made it so proud and great. 

IX. 

He was the duke whose oaken chair 
With curious carvings, quaint and rare, 
(Which pilgrims travel many a mile 
To gaze at in the old church-aisle,) — 
Stands empty, and will so remain ; 
For kings no longer rule but reign ! 

What prince to-day is fit 

In such a chair to sit ? 



236 EBERHART IM BART, 

X. 

• All hail the future age that brings 

An end to lords and dukes and kings, — 
And welcome be the casting down 
Of sword, of sceptre, and of crown ; 
Yet till the coming of the day 
When these from earth shall pass away, 

* If princes there must.be, 
Let them be such as he ! 



THE CHAMOIS HUNTER. 



THE CHAMOIS HUNTER, 



I. 

At eve, from the Altorf valley, 
Young Otto set out on his way 

To climb to the Alpine summit, 
And wait for the break of day. 



II. 

(For he who would hunt the chamois 

Must start from the vale at night, 

And clamber the cliffs ere morning, 

To hunt at the peep of light.) 

239 



240 THE CHAMOIS HUNTER. 

III. 
So, kissing his love at the sunset, 

He left her upon the moors — 
(For lovers must have their partings, 

Albeit their love endures). 



IV, 
He kissed her with burning kisses, 

And folded her to his heart; 
The sun in the sky blushed crimson 

At seeing them kiss and part. 



V. 
Young Otto looked back from the mountain 

Ere darkness had covered the land, 
And Agatha still in the twilight 

Stood waving to him her hand ' 



THE CHAMOIS HUNTER. 24 1 

VI. 

He lifted his hat and swung it, 

And shouted a loud halloo, 
Till echoes themselves woke echoes, 

And seven times bade her adieu. 



VII. 

So deathly a silence followed, 

It seemed that the winds on the hill, 

The tree-tops, the heart in his bosom, 
The blood in his pulse stood still ! 



VIII. 

Alone in the Alpine forest, 
Alone with the stars overhead, 

Alone with the dews and the night-owls, 
He talked to himself, and said: 



242 THE CHAMOIS HUNTER. 

IX. 

" The chamois are hard to follow, 
And little the gold they bring, 
But gold they must bring me to-morrow 
To buy for my bride a ring. 



x. 

Hark, that is the clock in the belfry ! 

How faintly it sounds from below ! 
It striketh the hour of midnight — 

How far I have yet to go ! 



XI. 

" Beneath me is sleeping the village ; 
My darling, how sleepeth she ? 
She sleepeth with spirit waking, 
And dreameth a dream of me. 



THE CHAMOIS HUNTER. , 243 

XII. 
" She dreameth of me and the chamois, — 
The chase and the dizzy leap ! 
She shrieketh my name in terror, 
And starts in her tender sleep ! 



XIII. 
" I would that as now she sleepeth, 
My head on her bosom lay ! 
The nearer I climb to heaven 
The further I am away ! 



XIV. 
" The air on the cliff grows colder, 
And whitens the rocks with frost ; 
A slip of the foot, and I perish — 
And life and its love are lost ! 



244 THE CHAMOIS HUNTER. 

XV. 

" Next Candlemas day, at the altar, 
Maid Agatha shall be mine, — 
And there shall be music and dancing, 
And there shall be cake and wine. 



XVI. 

At last I am here on the summit 
Or ever the East is gray, — 

With time for a snatch of slumber 
From now till the dawn of day. 



XVII. 

" So here will I spread my blanket, 
And here will I strike my fire ; 
How weary is he who wanders 
Away from his heart's desire ! 



THE CHAMOIS HUNTER. 245 

XVIII. 
Ye shades of the Alpine forest, 

That creep through the boughs of fir, 
Creep now through the fringe of my eyelids, 

And bring me a dream of her ! " 



XIX. 
He slumbered, and dreamed of the maiden 

And soft was the mountain sward, — 
For love is the balm of labor, 

And woman is man's reward. 



XX. 

He slept on the top of the mountain, 
Nor woke with the sun as it rose, — 

And there he shall sleep forever 
Beneath the eternal snows ! 



246 THE CHAMOIS HNTUER. 

XXI. 
They fell on him as he slumbered, 

Nor wakened him by their fall, 
And cold is the sheet that shrouds him, 

And white is his funeral pall. 



XXII. 
Maid Agatha sewed her a garment 

To wear at the altar rail ; 
The robe was a bride's apparel — 

The veil was a wedding veil ! 



XXIII. 

Maid Agatha went to her wedding, 
But not to the sound of mirth ; 

She wedded the Lord in heaven, 
His sorrowful bride on earth. 



THE CHAMOIS HUNTER. 247 

XXIV. 
She kneeleth a nun at the altar, 

And prayeth with white, wet face 
For peace to the soul of the lover 

Whom never her arms embrace. 



XXV. 

Her prayers, as they mount toward heaven, 

Rise part of the way and stop, 
And gather new burden of sorrow 

Each day on the mountain-top. 



PRINCE HEINRICH'S CARVING- 
KNIFE. 



PRINCE HEINRICH'S CARVING-KNIFE. 



A.D. I IO5. 



There never sat, before nor since, 

At any festive board, 
A carver like the Swabian prince, 

Who carved with his keen sword. 



II. 

Prince Heinrich, with his battle-brand, 

With retinue and state, 

Had come to claim Slavina's hand, 

But came an hour too late. 

251 



252 PRINCE HEINRICH'S CARVING-KNIFE. 

III. 

It was old Cruco's wedding-day, — 
Old Cruco's wedding-feast, — 

The wrinkled king, whose age, they say, 
Was ninety-nine at least. 



IV. 

There was a difference, it appears, 
Between the groom and bride, 

Of something more than fourscore years, 
And other things beside. 



The king drank deep, and dropped asleep, 

With chin upon his breast, 
And, in his nap, he failed to keep 

An eye upon his guest. 



PRINCE HEINRICH'S CAR VING-KNIFE. 2 5 3 

VI. 

Prince Heinrich for Slavina fair, 

To gratify her wish, 
Carved with his sword a titbit rare, 

And dropped it on her dish. 



VII. 

He carved it not from roasted ox. 
Nor suckling of the swine, 

Nor ibex of the Switzer rocks, 
Nor salmon of the Rhine. 



VIII. 

He carved no loin of fatted calf, 

Nor rib of boar or buck, 
Nor breast of pheasant, cut in half, 

Nor wing of mallard duck. 



254 PRINCE HEINRICH'S CARVING-KNIFE, 

IX. 

He carved while other guests caroused, 
But carved no bird nor lamb, 

Nor aught that on the meadows browsed, 
Nor in the waters swam. 



X. 

In spite of all the groaning board, 

Slavina would have starved 
Except for what Prince Heinrich's sword 

So deftly for her carved. 



XI. 

And hence the tale is yet to tell 
Of Heinrich's carving-knife, — 

For Heinrich loved Slavina well, 
Old Cruco's youthful wife. 



PRINCE HEINRICH'S CAR V1NG-KNIFE. 2 5 5 

XII. 

The youthful wife was yet a maid, 

Fresh from the altar rail, 
All in her bridal robes arrayed, 

But paler than her veil. 



XIII. 

In bridal robes she sat to dine, 

Yet tasted not a thing, — 
Nor cared for cutlet, chop, nor chine, — 

Nor fin, nor leg, nor wing. 



XIV. 

" O beauteous queen, you do not eat," 
Prince Heinrich said to her; 

" Now here are many sorts of meat, 
Which cut do you prefer? " 



2 5 6 PRINCE HEINRICH'S CAR VING-KNIFE. 

XV. 

" The cut which I would relish best," 

The wedded virgin said, 
" Is one a bride should scarce suggest, — 

Cut off the bridegroom's head ! " 



XVI. 

Prince Heinrich, without more ado, 
Upleaped with sword in hand, 

And bravely, like a lover true, 
Obeyed his love's command. 



XVII. 

He cut the head off at a blow, 
And dropped it on her plate ; 

But if she relished it or no 
The stories do not state. 



PRINCE HEINRICH'S CARVING-KNIFE. 2$? 

XVIII. 

They only tell how Heinrich gained 

The young queen for his wife, 
And how her castle he maintained 

With that same carving-knife. 



THE MINNESINGER'S WIFE. 



THE MINNESINGER'S WIFE. 

A.D. 1285. 



(GOTTFRIED VON NEUFEN SPEAKS:) 



I. 

NOT only in my lady's eyes 

Do I her beauty find, 
But all the lore that poets prize 

Is garnered in her mind. 

II. 

She is the soul of all I sing, 

For though to me belong 

The pipe, the shell, the chorded string, 

She is herself the song. 

261 



262 THE MINNESINGER'S WIFE. 

Hi- 
There is no wisdom in my word, 

Nor music in my lay, 
Save what I have more sweetly heard 

My lady sing or say, 



IV. 

She gazeth at the flower and star, 
And readeth in their looks 

A mystic meaning deeper far 
Than any writ in books, 



v. 

I often to my love have read 
The bards of olden times, 

And then some happy word she said 
Outrivalled all their rhymes. 



THE MINNESINGERS WIFE. 263 

VI. 

She is so fair, she is so wise, 

She is so pure in thought, 
She seems an angel of the skies 

Whom I have snared and caught. 



VII, 

She loves me with a love so true 

It never can be told, — 
A love like love when love was new, 

Before the earth grew old. 



. VIII. 
O never yet such lovers were, 

And nevermore shall be, 
For I am all the world to her, 

She, all the world to me ! 



APPENDI X. 



NOTES 



THE SILVER BELL OF STUTTGART 

In Stuttgart, every evening the year round, after the 
great clocks of the city have struck the hour of nine, and 
the reverberations have just died away into silence, a 
solitary silver bell rings on the top of the old cathedral 
called the Stiftkirche. Again at midnight, as soon as the 
clocks have made their clamor, and hushed their tongues, 
th,e silver bell — as if always a little belated, yet never far 
behind — repeats, all by itself, in a high key, and with a 
swift stroke, its cheerful and almost merry peal. 

It does not announce with measured beat the nine or 
twelve units of the hour, but rings with a hundred or 
more strokes, which are too rapid to be counted; and, after 
a couple of minutes of weird activity, it stops so suddenly 
that the ear fancies the hammer to be still beating. The 
bell is not connected with the works of a clock, nor rung 

267 



268 APPENDIX. 

by machinery ; the tongue is set swinging in the old- 
fashioned way by a bell-rope in a man's hand. The 
ringer stands near the top of the tower, not far below the 
over-hanging bell. It is commonly said in the city, that 
he is paid for his bell-ringing out of the annual income 
of a perpetual fund ; and that he must be at his lofty 
post every night at nine and twelve, like a sentinel on 
the watch. 

The bell has been rung in this stipulated way twice 
every night during the last five hundred years ; and is 
likely to be so rung for centuries to come. Stuttgart 
would not be Stuttgart without the silver bell ; which is 
a precious heir-loom of the city ; and is regarded by 
strangers with great interest, and by citizens with great 
affection. 

It is not a tocsin of alarm ; rior does it summon to 
cathedral-service, or wedding, or funeral ; nor does it 
herald the passing soul ; nor is it ponderous in size, or 
powerful in sound ; and if it were rung at nine in the 
morning, instead of at night, it would easily be mistaken 
for the brisk and cheery bell of a village-school. 

It is as famous as the great Gothic church over which 
it has so long hung, and yet not the oldest manuscripts in 



NOTES. 269 

the Stiftkirche give any explanation of the origin of the 
silver bell, nor any reason for its ever-recurrent peal at 
"Middle eve and middle night." 
This lack of history is supplied, if not authentically, at 
least romantically, in a popular German book entitled 
" Wurtemberg as it Was and Is." The following trans- 
lated extracts will suffice : 

" The Chatelaine of Weissenberg disappeared on the 
night before Palm Sunday, a.d. 1347, and no one could 
find the least trace of her. She had retired to her room 
as usual, and after her devotions, had gone to bed. In 
the morning one of the doors of the castle was found 
open ; and so no one was at first surprised that she was 
absent ; since it was her habit to go forth at dawn, either 
to pray in the quiet of the woods, or to visit the poor 
who needed her help. She usually returned at noon ; 
but as she had not done this, the people thought (it being 
a festival- day of the church) that she had probably gone 
to Stuttgart to attend the Stiftkirche, — then called the 
Church of the Holy Cross. No anxiety was felt at her 
absence till vespers ; then, as the night grew darker and 
darker, and she did not return, her friends grew more 
and more troubled about hef. Messengers were sent out 
in every direction to seek for her, but nowhere could any 
trace of her be found. The next day, more than a hun- 
dred people engaged in the search, but after a vain quest, 
they returned to the castle. 

" Then her daughter Ulrica lamented and wept bitterly. 
She would take no food nor drink, and clothed herself in 



270 APPENDIX. 

hair-cloth and wore a mask of wire over her head and 
face. She took all her silver ornaments of great value, 
and sent them to a founder, that he might make of them 
a bell of sweet and clear tone ; and when it was cast, she 
had it hung on the topmost edge of the tower, and every 
night with her own hands rang it at nine and twelve 
o'clock, as a sign that her heart ached for her mother. 

" At her death she left the following will, dated August 
3, 1348 : ' I, the testatrix, Ulrica Margaretta von Weis- 
senberg, hereby will and devise that when my strength 
fails, and I am no longer able to ring the silver bell, two 
hundred marks of silver shall be taken from my estate 
so that from the interest of this capital some one shall be 
paid to ring this bell every night at nine and twelve 
o'clock." 

The genuineness of the above-mentioned will would be 
more apparent if the original document, or any certified 
manuscript of it, could be produced ; or if the fund to 
which it refers had any existence in the treasury of the 
church or the city. The present writer's search for such 
documentary evidence was unsuccessful. The bell-ring- 
er's stipend is paid just as that of a letter-carrier or a 
street watchman would be paid ; that is, out of the mu- 
nicipal treasury, and not out of a private fund. 

The silver bell, if any one will take the sweaty pains to 
climb the tower and crawl out upon the roof and examine 
it, will be found gracefully shaped and ornamented, and 



NOTES. 271 

in perfect preservation ; and though it hangs in the open 
air, where it is exposed to all weathers and mildewed by 
all mists, yet every fresh rain cleanses and brightens it, 
and once again it glitters to the sun and moon. 

The metal probably contains far less silver than the 
legend ascribes to it ; otherwise the marauding hands of 
some needy Duke of Wurtemberg would long ago have 
purloined it as a prize, and coined it for his purse. 

The story of the Chatelaine of Weissenberg, as already 
quoted in part, has been told in various other ways. But 
not one of the narratives is consistent, natural, or plausi- 
ble. Accordingly, the incoherent fragments seemed to 
warrant the reconstruction of " the city's legend " into a 
more harmonious and logical form. The present tale- 
teller has taken the liberty of sifting and recasting the 
original materials, and of adding such new substance as 
poetic fancy suggested and poetic justice required. 

In the annals of Stuttgart, Ulrica's name is not so com- 
manding as that of Eberhart Im Bart, yet it is likely to 
survive as long as his in Swabian romance. 



272 APPENDIX. 

THE ROMANCE OF THE ROTHENBERG. 

William the First, the late king of Wiirtemberg, 
whose burly form, whose busy labors, and whose jovial 
manners are still vividly remembered throughout Swabia, 
was born in 1781, ascended the throne in 18 16, reigned 
nearly fifty years, and died in white old age, leaving 
behind him the fame of having been the chief author of 
the prosperity of the kingdom. 

In his first manhood , while crown-prince, he served 
zealously in the wars against Napoleon ; yet ever after- 
ward, as king, his ambition was wholly civic instead of 
military. Nor was his civic genius so much for statecraft 
as for practical business. Had he been a private man 
instead of a sovereign, he would have been a successful 
banker, or merchant, or layer-out of lots, or builder of 
houses. It may be said that his " ruling passion " was 
not to rule, but to build. He seldom had an idle day, 
and his perpetual occupation was that of a director of 
public works. His parks, his gardens, his roads, his 
bridges, his fountains, his hospitals : — these are the chief 
monuments of his energetic administration. They do 
more than his lofty pillar at Stuttgart to exalt his name, 



NOTES, 273 

and more than his clumsy equestrian statue in Cannstat 
to grace his memory. He was never tired of beautifying 
his capital, which he " found in brick and left in marble," 
or, rather, which he found hardly larger than a country 
village, and left one of the prettiest and thriftiest of the 
minor cities of Europe. Under his reign, Wurtemberg 
acquired its free constitution and its industrial prosperity. 

Now that the king rests from his labors, and now that 
these are fading from the remembrance of living men, his 
name happily survives in a romantic story of his love for 
his wife, Katrina. She was a Russian princess, whom he 
early married, queened, and lost ; to whom he built a 
stately tomb on the summit of the noble hill known as 
the Rothenberg, a few miles from Stuttgart ; and with 
whose ashes his own were finally intermingled in their 
lofty resting-place after a lapse of nearly half a cen- 
tury. 

Katrina, who lived only three years after her marriage, 
won for herself during that brief period the reverence of 
the whole nation, and is still affectionately called, " the 
mother of the land." Shortly after her coronation, the 
peasants of Swabia were grievously afflicted by the famine 
of 18 1 7 ; and the young and tender-hearted queen spent 
12* 



274 APPENDIX. 

a large part of her private fortune in feeding the 
poor. Her name became a synonym for charity and 
piety. 

The mausoleum on the Rothenberg is a circular Greek 
temple, partially squared by four out-jutting porticos, 
each portico having stately pillars and massive steps. 
The interior is furnished as a chapel, and contains marble 
statues of the Evangelists by Thorwaldsen and Danneker. 
The crypt is dimly seen through a heavy brass grating in 
the centre of the chapel-floor. Three times a year, and 
sometimes oftener, the service of the Greek church is 
performed at the altar. The temple is surrounded by a 
gigantic circle of rose-trees ; and when the roses are in 
bloom, the whole hill-top is as fragrant as a garden. The 
surrounding landscape, particularly at sunrise and sun- 
set, is noble, solemn, and impressive. 

King William buried the queen in 1819 ; and ever 
afterward, notwithstanding a later marriage, he main- 
tained a sentimental devotion to the bride of his youth, 
who was cut off in the morning of her life. Finally, in 
1864, in his 83 d year, he died and was buried by her 
side. His last will and testament decreed that his burial 
should be conducted privately, and in the night. But 



NOTES. 275 

kings cannot be buried with privacy. One of the co- 
temporary narratives of the funeral says : 

" He gave orders that his body should be taken from 
his castle (in Stuttgart) by night, accompanied only by 
the court-preacher, by the marshal, and by an adjutant 
and guard, and that the procession be so arranged as to 
reach the Rothenberg at the first dawn of day. A short 
prayer was to be said as the body was lowered into 
the crypt, and a single cannon-shot should make known 
to the city (five miles off) the moment of the interment. 
As the procession passed on through each successive 
village, each house, even the poorest, had lights in the 
windows, and showed black draperies in sign of mourn- 
ing ; and while the bells of all the neighboring villages 
were heard solemnly tolling, near and far, the citizens — 
men, women, and children — came forth from their homes 
weeping, and joined the line of march." 

The king's allusion in his will to the young wife who 
had died nearly half a century before him was in these 
words: 

" I wish to rest in the tomb built for my wife Katrina, 
and by her side, as I promised her." 

On the outer wall of the temple is this inscription : 
'* Die Liebe horet nimmer auf." 
(Love never faileth.) 



276 APPENDIX. 

THE FATE OF FRISCHLIN. 

Nicodemus Frischlin was a wit, linguist, poet, and 
professor in the University of Tubingen in the sixteenth 
century. His biography has been elaborately written by 
a Tubingen professor in the nineteenth, David Strauss, 
author of the well-known Life of Jesus. Until Strauss's 
biography was given to the world, Frischlin and his wife, 
Marguerite, from century to century, had lived in the 
popular imagination as the heroic figures of a romantic 
tradition. Exact history has, in this case, as in that of 
William Tell and others, done away with some of the 
picturesque features of the original folk-lore. The tra- 
dition, or one form of it, is given in the poem. The sifted 
historical facts may be briefly added here : 

The brilliant young Frischlin, who at twenty years of 
age filled the chair of Belles Lettres, was a proud son of 
the people, and refused to be ranked as the inferior of 
ignorant noblemen who could not write their names. He 
proclaimed the revolutionary doctrine that if Swabia 
must have an aristocracy, it should be an aristocracy 
based on merit and not on birth. He was profuse in his 
sarcasms at the pretentious nobility, and won great ap- 



NOTES. 277 

plause from the oppressed plebeians. He soon raised up 
for himself a host of enemies among the proud, and a 
host of friends among the poor. But while his enemies 
were ever ready to do him harm, his friends were seldom 
able to render him help. He thus acquired a perilous 
celebrity, and was everywhere an object of envy for his 
genius and scholarship, and of hatred for his unsparing 
attacks on the privileged classes. 

Strange to say, his chief opponent was a member of his 
own university — his fellow-professor Crusius ; who, hav- 
ing once been Frischlin's teacher, could not brook to be 
so soon eclipsed by his quondam pupil. An angry rivalry 
rose between the elder and the younger professor. They 
lampooned each other with speech and pen, book and 
epigram. It was a controversy of great learning and 
small courtesy. To quote at this late day what either 
said of the other would be no favor to the present reader. 
A more welcome specimen of Frischlin's wit will be found 
in the following literal translation of his satire on tavern- 
keepers : 

{Hiram soliloquizes, and is overheard by Sichar.) 

Hiram. Full many a thief and robber have I seen 



278 APPENDIX. 

hung, yet none who so well deserve the rope as the 
knaves who are called tavern-keepers ; for thieves steal 
by night, and in darkness ; highwaymen plunder in lone- 
some woods ; but these publicans rob in broad day, and 
attack travelers openly. Against such robbers there is 
no defense. But why do they blazon their sign-boards 
with names which unwittingly confess what kind of crea- 
tures they are ? One hangs out a Raven, and another 
an Eagle ; because with raven's beak, and eagle's claws, 
they mean to snatch the money of their guests. Some 
put up Lions, Bears, and Swine — as tokens that they 
themselves are voracious, thieving, and filthy. Some 
show Oxen and Stags — which is evidence of their hook- 
ing horns. The Goat is for bad manners and for bad 
smells. The proud Peacock, Hens, Geese, and Swans — 
all these are intimations that, like all these fowls, all the 
guests will be pitilessly plucked. 

" Sichar (aside). How wondrous strange it is that 
this fellow so well understands these symbolic signs ! 

" Hiram. The sign of the Crown means that the pub- 
lican is after men's crowns [namely, pieces of money]. 
A Sword or a Knife means, Here is a cut-throat. The 
Sun dries up all the richest sap, the Lamb and the Angel 
are but false masks. The Fox and the Ape are true 
signs. The guests only are the lambs, and these fine 
hosts are wolves in sheeps' clothing. 

" Sichar. It is a pity that this fellow is not an artist, 
he would be the best painter of tavern-signs. 

" Hiram. The honestest are they who choose the 
sign of Hell — for this seems to say, Here you have the 
Devil himself ! " 



NOTES. 279 

It is not surprising that the writer of the above satire 
when he chose to point his pen against the tyrannic no- 
bles, should have made them wince and writhe. An- 
other extract, in a different vein, will show how he lacer- 
ated the petty princes and lords of his day. He said : 

" What an empty pride is that which makes them call 
no one noble who cannot show a rusty, dusty es- 
cutcheon ! They put the most ignorant and untitled 
of the nobility far above the most cultivated men in all 
places. They take the best seats, and must everywhere 
be above poor Hans the peasant. In the palace, and in 
the court of justice, they have everything their own way, 
as if other people were of no account, and could do 
nothing without their countenance and favor." 

Such utterances as the above could not be safely made 
in the sixteenth century, even in England ; still less in 
Germany. Accordingly, on the 15th of April, 1590, 
Frischlin was' suddenly arrested in his bed-chamber, 
and hurried off to the high and frowning fortress which 
now crowns with its crumbling ruins the beautiful crest 
of Hohen Urach. There was no habeas corpus in those 
rude times. The circumstances of the arrest are thus 
related by Strauss : 

" At night, and during a violent thunderstorm, came 
five men in a six-horse carriage, and in the duke's name 
demanded entrance. It was about 10 o'clock. The 



280 APPENDIX. 

armed men surrounded Frischlin in bed, and bade him 
get up and follow them. In vain the sick and alarmed 
man begged them to let him rest during the night, pledg- 
ing his word that in the morning he would appear before 
the princes and judges, and answer for himself, even to 
the death. They took him out of bed, and, what filled 
him with the greatest anxiety, they bandaged his eyes, 
and drew a black Spanish cap over his head. They 
bound him on a horse, and with lanterns and torches led 
him out of the castle-yard. Frischlin, fearing the worst, 
cried out, " Is there no loyal Wurtefnberger who will tell 
me whither I am to be taken ? " He counted all the 
brooks which he crossed, hoping thereby to discover 
the direction of his journey. Chance helped him 
to this knowledge. In passing by Gretzingen, at early 
dawn, a peasant in a wagon met the party. " Where did 
you come from ? " asked one of them. " From Uracil," 
was the reply ; which gave the prisoner the first hint of 
his destination. Others say that he had it from a beg- 
gar. At all events, from some passer-by he learned that 
he was to be taken to Hohen Urach." 

Frischlin 's treatment in his dungeon was severe. At 
first he was denied pen, ink, and paper. He then was 
given two quires of writing-paper, which he quickly con- 
sumed in writing letters to his wife, the fair Marguerite. 
Afterward he is found thanking his keeper for more 
writing-materials : — " without which," he says," I could 
not live." 



NOTES. 28 1 

He busied himself with literary composition ; the fruit 
of his prison-labors being the Hebrais, the comedy of 
Susanna, and a translation of the Psalms of David into 
Latin. 

His incarceration so wrought upon his spirits that 
though he was only in the forty-third year-of his age, 
and was of powerful frame, with glowing health, his hair 
turned gray in a single month. " The thought of my 
wife," said he, " prevents my sleep." 

She made many attempts to interest influential people 
in his * behalf, and on one occasion gave up her family 
jewels and her personal ornaments to purchase the inter- 
cession Of a court favorite. In one of her letters to the 
authorities, she petitions to be allowed to send to her 
husband some needful clothing and some comforting 
books ; calling him endearingly her " chief treasure in 
this world." For a long time she was refused permis- 
sion to visit him in his prison ; and even after the re- 
striction was modified, she saw him but seldom. In the 
beginning of November, a fortnight before his unex- 
pected death, his aged mother held an interview with 
him in his cell, and urged him to make his peace with 
the offended nobles. What answer he made to her, he 



282 APPENDIX, 

did not record ; for his pen suddenly dropped from his 
hand forever. 

He met a tragic death in a brave effort to escape. 
His plan was to lower himself from his window by a long 
cord to a ledge of rocks far below. This line he made 
by tearing into strips his clothing and blankets. On 
Sunday night, November 29th, 1590, he fastened one end 
of the cord to his window-sill, flung the rest out of the 
window, and attempted — hand under hand, like a sailor 
on a rope — to let himself down into liberty ; but instead, 
he dashed out his life. His dead body was found on 
the rocks next morning, mangled almost beyond recog- 
nition. The details of the accident are not known. 
The conjectures are numerous. One is that the line 
broke ; another, that it was too short ; another, that he 
lost his grip ; another, that he missed his foothold. 

Strauss could not ascertain on which side of the cas- 
tle the captive was confined, and therefore could not 
know on which side of the mountain he tried to descend. 
Visitors to the ruins are now told that Frischlin's cell 
was the one facing the north. This is conjecture, but 
the conjecture is plausible. For if a stone be let fall 
from this point, it will strike the ledge below, glance off, 



NOTES. 283 

and roll to the bottom of the valley ; and as the shat- 
tered body of the fugitive is said to have been found at 
or near the bottom, it may have struck, glanced off, and 
rolled down in the same way. 

The wounds are circumstantially stated to have been 
these : the neck broken, the cheeks destroyed, the right 
hand crushed, the right eye gashed, and a rib on the left 
side broken in two. 

His funeral was held in the church at Urach, and the 

body was buried in the adjoining graveyard. The grave 

has never had a monument, nor is the spot even yet 

marked with his name. His kindly-hearted biographer 

says : 

" Frischlin's grave, for which man did nothing, nature 
adorned. The most beautiful roses grew above it, and 
many poets of the time have praised the rosy grave of 
the poet. Nor did the mountain on which he met his 
death fail of a mystical sign. A clover-leaf with a dark 
spot, which looked like a blood-stain, grew there. 
When this is now transplanted, it will not flourish else- 
where." 

The above assertion, strange as it may seem, has been 
confirmed to the author of the present notes by an intel- 
ligent student of botany who carefully examined into 
the facts. 



284 APPENDIX. 

A tradition exists that on the night of Frischlin's fatal 
enterprise, the moon was shining, instead of the snow fall- 
ing ; but as there is no evidence to support either state- 
ment, the one is as valid as the other. 

Various tales are told of Marguerite, the most pleasing 
being the version given in the poem. Its historical ac- 
curacy cannot be vindicated, except in part. But truths 
of fancy are as precious to the world as truths of fact. 



THE ASS OF HOHEN NEUFEN. 

This ass is a famous figure in the history of the castle 

of Hohen Neufen. The neighboring villages have various 

incredible traditions concerning him ; one of the most 

absurd of which is chronicled in Gustav Schwab's work 

on the Swabian Alps. He says : 

" When the fortress was standing, in the keeper's sec- 
ond room an ass's foot hung on the wall. This was be- 
cause, in the olden time, an ass was employed as a water- 
carrier for the castle. The fortress was once so closely 
besieged that the garrison were brought to the direst 
straits from hunger. The ass, however, was so well-fed 
that he died from surfeit. The garrison flung his swol- 
len body over the walls to the enemy. When the be- 
siegers, who had hoped to reduce the fortress by starva- 



NOTES. 285 

tion, saw this fat carcass, they judged that the garrison 
must still have an abundance of food. They determined 
to raise the siege and retire. In grateful remembrance 
of the ass of Hohen Neufen, his foot was hung up, and 
kept in the castle, which he had unwittingly saved from 
surrender. A woman of wealth, remembering this good 
service by the ass, endowed for his descendants a pasture- 
field which is still known as the asses' meadow." 

The above tale is less credible and less pleasing than 
the tradition embodied in the poem ; less credible, be- 
cause, if the dead ass had been thrown over the battle- 
ments to the enemy, one of his feet would hardly have 
made its way back to the keeper's room ; less pleasing, 
because the reader's fancy seems to demand that the ass, 
after rendering a public service, should receive a public 
reward. The cruel writers who have killed the ass of 
Hohen Neufen, and have handled his carcass so rudely, 
are not to be thanked. The gentle-hearted dame who 
afterward gave his tribe a meadow, deserves that her 
name be remembered, but only her deed survives ; — 
pointing the moral how a rich testator may bequeath a 
fortune and be forgotten, and how an ass may inherit it 
and be renowned. 

It should be added that the stupendous ruins which 
crown the summit of Hohen Neufen are the most com- 



286 APPENDIX. 

manding and impressive of all the feudal monuments in 
Swabia ; nor, except in Heidelberg, have they a match in 
all Germany. 



THE MAIDS AND WIVES OF WEINSBERG. 

This story has been told by Montaigne in French, by 

Burger in German, by Addison in English, and by other 

writers in other tongues. The historical facts are stated 

as follows in Menzel's History of Germany : 

" It was in 1141, when besieging the Welf in Weins- 
berg, that the Germans changed their war cry, ' Kyrie 
eleison ! ' for the party cries ' the Welf !' 'the Waiblin- 
ger ! ' After enduring a long siege, Welf was compelled 
to surrender, Conrad granting free egress to the women, 
with whatever they were able to carry. The Duchess 
accordingly took her husband, Welf, on her shoulders. 
And all the women of the city following her example, 
they proceeded out of the city gates, to the great aston- 
ishment of the emperor, who, struck with admiration at 
this act of heroism, permitted the garrison to withdraw, 
exclaiming to those who attempted to dissuade him, ' An 
emperor keeps his word.'" 

It may be added that the names Welf and Waiblinger 
correspond with Guelph and Ghibelline. 



NOTES. 28; 

EBERHART IM BART. 

Eberhart im Bart (or, "with the beard") is the 
national hero of Swabia, the George Washington of 
Wiirtemberg. 

He is not to be confounded with a famous Count 
Eberhart who lived a hundred years earlier — the robber 
baron who called himself " the friend of God and foe of 
all mankind." 

Eberhart im Bart, whose memory all Swabians revere, 
and to whose ever-growing reputation they are constantly 
erecting new statues, was the fifth of the Eberharts, and 
the greatest statesman of all who bore that name. 

He was born in the Castle at Urach, December n, 
1445, son to Count Ludwig, the Elder. Like Prince 
Hal of England, who lived in the next preceding gene- 
ration, young Eberhart spent a few of his early years in 
riotous living, but soon turned from his youthful follies 
to soberer things. At the age of fourteen he lost his 
father, who, at his death, left Count Ulrich to be regent 
until the boy should become of age and inherit the 
county. Count Ulrich was the lad's uncle, and not a 
favorite with his ward ; whereupon the ambitious youth, 



288 APPENDIX. 

by a genius of statescraft which manifested itself with 
remarkable precocity, deposed his good-natured uncle, 
and seized the government himself ; governing, as a boy, 
with the same striking dignity which was. to be shown 
two centuries later by the "young Louis XIV of France. 

David Strauss speaks of " the two pearls among the 
Wiirtemberg princes :" the first of these was Eberhart im 
Bart, the second was Duke Christopher. 

In Eberhart's time, Martin Luther had not yet arisen, 
and Swabia had not yet become Protestant ; so the 
young Eberhart, being a good Catholic, and resolving to 
expiate his youthful follies, made a penitential pilgrim- 
age to the Holy Land, where he consecrated his sword 
by laying it on the supposed tomb of Jesus Christ at Je- 
rusalem. . 

On his return, he became regent over a somewhat 
wider realm than his original narrow domain, and greatly 
distinguished himself as an administrator of public af- 
fairs. He was a lover and promoter of peace, industry, 
learning, and religion. His political aim was to prevent 
the local feuds and petty wranglings which, through all 
Swabia, had set baron against baron, castle against cas- 
tle, and town against town ; and to unite the Swabians 



NOTES. 289 

into something like civil unity., under a government of 
law. He succeeded to such a degree that he compacted 
many small municipalities into what thus became the 
Duchy of Wurtemberg, a patriotic service for which 
he has ever since been called " the father of the 
land." 

In 1477 he founded the University of Tubingen, an in- 
stitution which is to this day his living monument. 

In 1488 he was chosen head of the celebrated Swabian 
League, an organization which Menzel's History of Ger- 
many thus describes : 

" This league was originally an aristocratic society, 
known as that of St. George's shield, which, by the incor- 
poration of the clergy and of the citizens within its 
ranks, became a general union of all the princes, counts, 
knights, bishops, abbots, and cities in Swabia for the 
maintenance of peace and right." 

In 1495 tne title of Duke of Wurtemberg and Teck 

was solemnly conferred upon Eberhart by the German 

Emperor Maximilian, at the royal city of Worms, amid 

circumstances of great splendor. A Swabian narrative 

of this memorable event is as follows : 

" As Count Eberhart had shown himself so great a 
benefactor of his land, and in all respects a prince such 
as there were few in Germany, the emperor desired to 
13 



290 



APPENDIX. 



honor him, and invited him to the Diet at Worms, a.d. 
1495, to confer upon him the ducal crown. Eberhart 
hesitated long, and declined the honor, fearing that Wiir- 
temberg might be regarded as an. appanage of the house 
of Austria ; but when the emperor learned the reason of 
his hesitation, and promised that Wurtemberg as a duke- 
dom should have its rights and freedom, Eberhart ac- 
cepted the honor, and on the 21st of July, 1495, was 
invested with the ducal crown in the presence of a great 
assemblage of the electors and princes of the realm. 
The festivities occurred in an open field before the city 
of Worms. The emperor in royal robes sat on the 
throne, and Eberhart was summoned before him, accom- 
panied by two landgraves of Hesse. The chancellor in 
a speech praised the services of Eberhart, and of the 
Wurtemberg people. Eberhart was then invested with 
the ducal coat, hat, and mantle. The emperor gave him 
a sword, which is still preserved, and proclaimed him 
Duke of Wurtemberg and Teck. Then Eberhart took 
his place among the old dukes, in presence of the land- 
graves, margraves, and other magnates." 

During the above proceedings a feast was held at 
which each of the dukes boasted of what made his own 
dukedom great. Saxony was lauded for its mines and 
metals ; Bavaria for its cities and towns ; the Rhine Pa- 
latinate for its vineyards and wines. Swabia, said Eber- 
hart, could boast no such things ; yet he, as its ruler, 
could safely travel through his whole dukedom, unarmed 



NOTES. 291 

and unattended, and could trust himself to fall asleep 

pillowed upon the lap of any peasant. This remark soon 

became famous throughout Germany, and has since been 

the frequent theme of poets and artists. 

"After his elevation in the Diet," Menzel says, "a 
dispute having arisen concerning the seat that was his 
due, he replied that he would willingly sit behind the 
stove, if only the council would do some useful 
thing." 

Duke Eberhart lived only a year after receiving his 
coronet, and, though not an old man, died in 1496, foui 
years after Columbus discovered a hemisphere which to- 
day contains as many Swabians as Swabia itself. Eber- 
hart's friend, the Emperor Maximilian, visiting his tomb 
in St. George's Church at Tubingen, said, " Here lies a 
prince who was without a peer in Germany ; one in 
whose advice I always found profit." 

Duke Eberhart' s historic beard was red, like that of 
Frederick Barbarossa until age turned it gray. It was 
probably not longer than ordinary beards of the present 
day ; for a portrait of Eberhart, taken from life, a copy 
of which was lately presented to the Castle at Urach by 
the Emperor William, shows a beard of no unusual size ; 
but 'tradition will have it that his beard should keep 



292 APPENDIX. 

growing with his fame, and be always a part of his title ; 
and he probably will never cease to be called Eberhart 
im Bart. 

He died without issue, and it may be said of him, as 
was said of Washington, " Providence made him childless 
that he might be the father of his people." 

Duke Eberhart's chair of state — made of oak and cu- 
riously carved — is kept in the church of St. Amandus at 
Urach. A colossal bronze statue, representing him on 
horseback, with uplifted sword, and in complete armor, 
with beard copious but not abnormal, acforns the fore- 
court of the old castle in Stuttgart. It was designed by 
Hofer, who still lives to enjoy, in his green old age, the 
compliments which are profusely paid to this careful and 
noticeable work. A recent statue in marble, by a Tyrol- 
ese artist, stands in the park between Stuttgart and Cann- 
stat, and commemorates the boast of the old duke that 
he could safely sleep on a peasant's lap. 



CHARLEMAGNE AND HILDEGARD. 

If a grave historian puts faith in this pretty tale, 



NOTES. 293 

surely a poet need not apologize for its romantic extrav- 

gance. Menzel thus relates it : 

" Beauty and virtue guided Charlemagne's choice of a 
wife more than high birth. It is related of Hildegard, 
the Swabian, whom he wedded shortly after his divorce 
from the Lombard princess, that a servant named T aland, 
enraged at the contempt with which she treated his 
criminal advances, accused her of infidelity to the em- 
peror, who divorced her also ; upon which she retired to 
Rome, where for some time she led a life of great sanc- 
tity, and devoted herself to the care of the sick, until 
happening to meet with Taland, wandering about blind, 
she restored fcum to sight, and the wretched man, struck 
with remorse, confessed his crime, and led her back to 
her husband." 



THE BESIEGED NUNS OF KIRCHHEIM. 

In Heinrich Gebhardt's History of Kirchheim is the 

following passage : 

"In 1476 Eberhart the Younger, with a band of his 
roystering companions, visited the cloister and there 
held such an orgy that, his father, Ulrich, the Well-Be- 
loved, wrote him a letter of reproof, in which he said, 
1 Such a dance and mad revel would have been a disgrace 
even to a house of ill-fame.' Two years later, on account 
of this carousal, the convent was reformed, and a new 



294 APPENDIX. 

abbess appointed. In i486, Eberhart the Younger made 
a demand upon the nuns for money. On their refusal, 
he determined to compel them, through hunger, to his 
extortions. After the nuns had appealed to the emperor, 
to Count Eberhart of the Beard, and to the Bishop of 
Constance, and the latter had threatened the count and 
the town with excommunication, he withdrew ; but in 
winter he returned, and besieged the cloister so closely 
for three months that the nuns were obliged to burn all 
the trees in the convent grounds, and were even think- 
ing of burning the sacred images of the altar. Their 
food began to fail ; but they were resolute, and kept up 
their spirits by dreams and prophecies. At length Count 
Eberhart of the Beard came with four thousand men 
from Stuttgart, and on the 12th of February, 1488, made 
himself master of the town and convent, and richly indem- 
nified the nuns for their previous sufferings. 

" The widow of Count Eberhart, Barbara, Countess of 
Mantua, was buried here." 

Kirchheim is now a quiet village, a few miles from the 

ruins of Hohen Neufen and Teck ; and the old cloister, 

or rather the present building on the site of the former, 

is used as an asylum for poor old women. 



BALLAD OF A BABY. 

Duke Friedrich, of Thuringia, who flourished in the 
fourteenth century, was of the Swabian house of the 



NOTES. 295 

Hohenstaufen. He .married Elizabeth, daughter of his 
father's mistress. Both women were noted for their 
beauty, but the daughter so outshone her mother that 
the poet Horace's famous compliment might have been 
written expressly for her. 

Her husband, Duke Friedrich, was a man of gigantic 
stature, as is proven by his large armor, which is still pre- 
served in the Wartberg. He was besieged by his enemy, 
Albrecht, and compelled to make a hasty flight from the 
Wartberg, but the tide of war afterward turned in his 
favor, and between the years 1357 and 1359 he recon- 
quered his lost possessions. 

The historical basis for the poem is given by Rohte as 

follows : 

" Friedrich was driven from the Wartberg, with his 
new-born daughter, who cried incessantly during the 
flight. Although the enemy was close at hand, he 
stopped and asked the nurse what ailed the babe. The 
nurse replied, ' My lord, she will not be quiet until she 
is suckled.' So he ordered his men to halt, saying, ' My 
child shall have her desire though it cost me all Thu- 
ringia ; ' and drawing up his men in front, remained by his 
babe's side until she had been suckled." 



296 APPENDIX. 



THE KING'S WAGER. 

To look for an historical foundation for this tale would 
be like searching into the authenticity of the adventures 
of King Cophetua, or into the identity of the Lord of 
Burleigh 



PRINCE HEINRICH'S CARVING-KNIFE. 

The King of the Rugii, Cruco, met his death at the 
hands of a neighboring Swabian rival, Prince Heinrich, 
in the manner described as follows : 

" Cruco's beautiful wife, Slaviria, who was deeply 
enamored of the youthful Henry, entered into a plot, 
and Cruco was deprived of his head at the banquet- 
table by a single stroke of his adversary's sword, a.d. 
iio$:'—Menzel t Vol. I. 



THE MINNESINGER'S WIFE. 

This poem is put into the mouth of Gottfried von 
Neufen, because he was one of the chief minnesingers of 



NOTES. 297 

his time. He was a grandson of the famous Count Ber- 
thold von Neufen mentioned in a previous tale. Gott- 
fried's- lays were written in the quaint old German of the 
thirteenth century. He gayly celebrated the red lips of 
his wife in some stanzas which still remain. 
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